Slovenians vote in close race between ruling liberals and populist right

By Fatos Bytyci and Daria Sito-Sucic

LJUBLJANA, March 22 (Reuters) - Slovenians voted on Sunday in a parliamentary election pitting incumbent liberal Prime Minister Robert Golob against right-wing populist Janez Jansa, with neither looking set to win a majority in a vote that could be decided by smaller coalition partners.

More than 362,000 people, or 21.38% of the electorate, had cast their votes by 11 a.m. (1000 GMT), slightly more than the 21% in the 2022 poll which recorded an historic turnout of 71%, said Slovenia's election commission, which is expected to announce preliminary results after 8.30 p.m local time.

Opinion polls before the vote indicated pro-Donald Trump Jansa's Slovenian Democratic Party (SDS) and Golob's Freedom Movement (GS) were set for a close race after a last-minute drama involving allegations of foreign meddling and graft.

Jansa said the vote is one of the most important in Slovenia's 35 years of independence, and will decide the future direction of the country.

"I hope that Slovenia will get rid of the organised criminal organisation," he told reporters after casting his vote in the village of Arnace, 85 km northwest of the capital Ljubljana.

Analysts say Jansa, who is seeking a fourth term as premier of the European Union and NATO member state of 2 million people, has a devoted voter base and the lower the turnout, the higher the chances of him winning the election.

At stake is Slovenia's domestic and foreign agenda, where the outgoing government had focused on social and health reforms but delivered mixed results. 

Jansa has promised to introduce tax breaks for businesses and cut funding for civil society, welfare and media.

Pro-Israeli Jansa, who is an ally of Hungary's veteran nationalist leader Viktor Orban, would also likely change Golob's foreign policy under which Slovenia was one of the few European countries that recognised an independent Palestinian state and last year imposed an arms embargo on Israel.

Casting his vote after his government had imposed restrictions of fuel purchases at the pump caused in part by cross-border fuelling and stockpiling due to the Iran war, Golob urged voters to "follow your heart, feed it with love for your country and the path ahead will be clear".

DIRTY CAMPAIGN, GRAFT ALLEGATIONS, FOREIGN MEDDLING FEARS

The election campaign, which observers described as dirty from the start, heated up this month when covert videos were published on an anonymous website purportedly exposing government corruption.

A report this week alleged that Jansa met with officials from Israeli private spy firm Black Cube, which LinkedIn alleged in 2023 was behind a hidden camera campaign that targeted activists and journalists in the lead-up to Hungary's 2022 vote.

"No politeness, some lies that came out on one side or the other, so I didn't feel they were telling us, the voters, the story that we could follow," Ifigenija Simonovic, a 73-year-old writer, said after voting in Ljubljana.

"So to decide today, it really wasn't easy."