The Free Forum ( sk, Slobodné fórum, ; "Free" in the sense of " freedom") was a

political party A political party is an organization that coordinates candidates to compete in a particular country's elections. It is common for the members of a party to hold similar ideas about politics, and parties may promote specific political ideology ...

Slovakia Slovakia (; sk, Slovensko ), officially the Slovak Republic ( sk, Slovenská republika, links=no ), is a landlocked country in Central Europe. It is bordered by Poland to the north, Ukraine to the east, Hungary to the south, Austria to the ...

, founded in 2004 by dissident parliamentarians from the

Slovak Democratic and Christian Union Slovak may refer to: * Something from, related to, or belonging to Slovakia (''Slovenská republika'') * Slovaks, a Western Slavic ethnic group * Slovak language Slovak () , is a West Slavic language of the Czech–Slovak group, written in ...

(SDKÚ).

Zuzana Martináková Zuzana Martináková (born 5 May 1961 in Púchov, Czechoslovakia) is a Slovak politician and a former journalist. She is the leader of the political party Free Forum. Life Martináková is a graduate of the Comenius University in Bratislava. S ...

is the leader of the party. The Free Forum was founded in January 2004 by Ivan Šimko and other

MPs. Two months later,

was elected party leader, and Šimko left later that year. In the 2006 parliamentary election, the party won 3.47% of the vote: falling short of the 5% threshold to join the

Slovak Parliament The National Council of the Slovak Republic ( sk, Národná rada Slovenskej republiky), abbreviated to ''NR SR'', is the national parliament of Slovakia. It is unicameral and consists of 150 members, who are elected by universal suffrage under ...

. In the 2010 parliamentary election, the party formed part of Union – Party for Slovakia, which won only 0.7% of the vote.

History

* 13 January 2004 – Ivan Šimko and a group of MPs left the SDKÚ, after frictions with

Mikuláš Dzurinda Mikuláš Dzurinda (; born 4 February 1956) is a Slovak politician who was the prime minister of Slovakia from 30 October 1998 to 4 July 2006. He is the founder and leader of the Slovak Democratic Coalition (SDK) and then the Slovak Democratic a ...

* 27 March 2004 – Zuzana Martináková was elected the party leader * October 2004 – Ivan Šimko left the party and founded a new political party named Mission 21 (Slovak: Misia 21) * 17 April 2009 – became an observer member of the

European Liberal Democrat and Reform Party European, or Europeans, or Europeneans, may refer to: In general * ''European'', an adjective referring to something of, from, or related to Europe ** Ethnic groups in Europe ** Demographics of Europe ** European cuisine, the cuisines of Europe a ...

(until 2011)

References

External links

Official site
Liberal parties in Slovakia {{Europe-liberal-party-stub