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Michal Šimečka (born 10 May 1984) is a Slovak politician, journalist, and researcher, who served as a
Vice-President of the European Parliament There are fourteen vice-presidents of the European Parliament who sit in for the President of the European Parliament, president in presiding over the plenary of the European Parliament. Role Vice-presidents are members of the Bureau (European P ...
between 2022 and 2023. He also became a
Member of the European Parliament A member of the European Parliament (MEP) is a person who has been Election, elected to serve as a popular representative in the European Parliament. When the European Parliament (then known as the Common Assembly of the European Coal and S ...
between 2019 and 2023. In 2020, Šimečka was elected vice-president of the European political group Renew Europe. He is a co-founder of the social-liberal Progressive Slovakia party, leading it from 2022.


Early life and education

Šimečka earned a bachelor's degree in political sciences and international relations from the
Charles University Charles University (CUNI; , UK; ; ), or historically as the University of Prague (), is the largest university in the Czech Republic. It is one of the List of oldest universities in continuous operation, oldest universities in the world in conti ...
in
Prague Prague ( ; ) is the capital and List of cities and towns in the Czech Republic, largest city of the Czech Republic and the historical capital of Bohemia. Prague, located on the Vltava River, has a population of about 1.4 million, while its P ...
in 2006. He obtained an MPhil in Russian and East European Studies at St Antony's College at the
University of Oxford The University of Oxford is a collegiate university, collegiate research university in Oxford, England. There is evidence of teaching as early as 1096, making it the oldest university in the English-speaking world and the List of oldest un ...
in 2008, before moving to
Nuffield College Nuffield College () is one of the Colleges of the University of Oxford, constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in England. It is a graduate college specialising in the social sciences, particularly economics, politics and sociology. N ...
, where he received a DPhil in Politics and International Relations in 2012.


Political career


Member of the European Parliament (2019–2023)

Šimečka is a member of the European Parliament Intergroup on LGBT Rights and European Parliament Intergroup on Traditional Minorities, National Communities and Languages. During the European Parliament elections in May 2019, Šimečka was the leader of the coalition candidate Progressive Slovakia and Democrats, which won with a profit of 20.11%. He was elected MEP with 81,735 preferential votes. Later that November, Šimečka was elected rapporteur on the establishment of an EU Mechanism on Democracy, the Rule of Law and Fundamental Rights. In October 2020, Šimečka presented his proposal for a mechanism combining several tools which monitor the respect of rule of law and European values, which received majority support in the
European Parliament The European Parliament (EP) is one of the two legislative bodies of the European Union and one of its seven institutions. Together with the Council of the European Union (known as the Council and informally as the Council of Ministers), it ...
. He explained that the EU should do more to address the abuse of EU funding, writing that "an implicit bargain between net contributors and net recipients" should end. From 2020 until 2021, Šimečka served as deputy chair of the Renew Europe parliamentary group, under the leadership of chair
Dacian Cioloș Dacian Julien Cioloș (; born 27 July 1969) is a Romanian Agronomy, agronomist who served as Prime Minister of Romania from November 2015 to January 2017. He previously served as Ministry of Agriculture, Forests and Rural Development (Romania), A ...
.


Member of the National Council of Slovakia (2023–present)

In the 2023 Slovak parliamentary election, Šimečka ran as the leader of the Progressive Slovakia list, which won 32 mandates in the National Council. He personally received over 300,000 preferential votes, the third highest number after Robert Fico and
Peter Pellegrini Peter Pellegrini (; born 6 October 1975) is a Slovak politician who is serving as the sixth president of Slovakia since 2024. He previously served as prime minister of Slovakia from 2018 to 2020. Pellegrini also served as the Minister of Health, ...
. Immediately after the election, he gave up vice-presidency of the EP as well as his MEP mandate to focus on leading the opposition in Slovakia. As the leader of the second strongest faction, Šimečka unsuccessfully tried to prevent the SMER party from coming back to power by forming a coalition government with
Voice – Social Democracy Voice – Social Democracy (, Hlas-SD) is a social democratic and populist political party in Slovakia. It was founded in 2020 by dissidents from Direction – Social Democracy (Smer-SD) led by former prime minister Peter Pellegrini. In October ...
,
Freedom and Solidarity Freedom and Solidarity (, SaS), also called Saska, is a Centre-right politics, centre-right political party in Slovakia. Established in 2009,. SaS was founded by economist Richard Sulík, who designed Slovakia's flat tax system. It generally hol ...
and Christian Democratic Movement. Nonetheless, this effort failed because Peter Pellegrini, the leader of Voice, decided to form a coalition government with SMER and the
Slovak National Party The Slovak National Party (, SNS) is an ultranationalist political party in Slovakia. The party characterizes itself as a nationalist party based on both social and European Christian values. Since 1990 SNS has won seats in every Slovak pa ...
instead. On 25 October 2023, Šimečka was elected vice-president of the National Council. He received 92 votes, 29 MPs voted against and 21 abstained. Nonetheless, in September 2024, the prime minister Robert Fico demanded his removal, accousing Šimečka's family of profiting from over a million euro in public subsidy. Šimečka rejected the allegations, arguing his relatives active in cultural and NGO sphere legitimately applied for grant funding which he could no influence in any way because Progressive Slovakia was never a part of government. Moreover, a major part of the funding was approved during previous governments of Robert Fico. Progressive Slovakia published a list of dozens of coalition MPs, whose relatives received public subsidies, arguing its a common and legitimate situation. Nonetheless, on 17 September 2024, Šimečka lost a non-confidence vote with the slightest possible majority of 76, with three government MPs, all from the Voice party, rebelling and not voting for Šimečka's removal. Following the vote, Šimečka stated the vote was an "unprecedented political revenge" targeting him as the leader of the opposition. The vote resulted in international condemnation as well.
Valérie Hayer Valérie Hayer (; born 6 April 1986) is a French jurist and politician who has been serving as a Member of the European Parliament (MEP) since 2019 in the Renew Europe. Since 2024, she has been leading the Renew Europe group in parliament. She ...
, the leader of Renew Europe fraction in the European Parliament strongly condemned the removal of Šimečka at a plenary meeting of the European Parliament, stating its was "another step towards undermining democracy in Slovakia by the regime of Robert Fico". 20 Czech prominent personalities, including the former PM of Czechia
Petr Pithart Petr Pithart (born 2 January 1941) is a Czech politician, lawyer and political scientist who served as Prime Minister of the Czech Republic (then a federal region of Czechoslovakia) from 6 February 1990 to 2 July 1992. He was also the Senator fo ...
called for the speaker of the Czech Parliament
Markéta Pekarová Adamová Markéta Pekarová Adamová (born 2 October 1984) is a Czech Republic, Czech politician who is the President of the Chamber of Deputies (Czech Republic), President of the Chamber of Deputies since 2021 and leader of TOP 09 since 2019. She has bee ...
to suspend any contacts with the Slovak parliament. In January 2025, large anti-government protests organised by a protest group Mier Ukrajine () broke out in Slovakia. The same year on 31 January, prime minister of Slovakia Robert Fico together with Slovak Information Service showed photographs of Mamuka Mamulashvili, a leader of the Georgian National Legion ( designated as a terrorist group by the Russian government) with opposition activist Lucia Štasselová (2023 photograph from public debate in Bratislava) and online news commentator Martin M. Šimečka, the father of opposition leader Michal Šimečka (photo from the handover of humanitarian aid purchased from a fundraising for Mamulashvili's unit in November 2023). Despite the age and circumstances of both photos, Fico used them to accuse the activists and the government opposition of plotting a
coup d'état A coup d'état (; ; ), or simply a coup , is typically an illegal and overt attempt by a military organization or other government elites to unseat an incumbent leadership. A self-coup is said to take place when a leader, having come to powe ...
in the country, which they denied.


Political views

Šimečka supports the LGBT community, voicing support for the Rainbow Ribbon campaign in 2021.


Personal life

Šimečka is the son of journalists Martin Milan Šimečka and Marta Šimečková (née Frišová). He lives in Bratislava with his partner Soňa Ferienčíková and their daughter Táňa (b. 2020).


References


External links


European Parliament Profile
{{DEFAULTSORT:Simecka, Michal 1984 births Living people Politicians from Bratislava Charles University alumni Alumni of St Antony's College, Oxford Alumni of Nuffield College, Oxford Slovak journalists Progressive Slovakia politicians MEPs for Slovakia 2019–2024 Slovak LGBTQ rights activists Members of the National Council (Slovakia) 2023–2027