Merry Christmas Slovenia
The government is refunding covid fines
https://www.euronews.com/2023/11/29/slovenia-begins-refunding-thousands-of-covid-fines
I guess in some countries the jig is up. Way to lead Slovenia!
“Hardline pandemic control measures saw Slovenians sanctioned for breaches as minor as eating a sandwich alone outdoors.
The Slovenian government is repaying thousands of fines issued to citizens who broke masking and social distancing orders during the worst of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The total amount issued in COVID fines between March 2020 and May 2022 was around €5.7 million. Under legislation put forward by the country's centre-left government, the €1.7 million that had actually been paid in penalties will now be refunded.
All infractions will be redacted from peoples' official records and proceedings to enforce penalties will be halted.
Among the tens of thousands expecting a refund is a delivery driver who was infamously photographed surrounded by police after lowering his mask to eat a snack while sitting outdoors well away from anyone else.
The footage of the man, who was fined €400, rankled many Slovenians who considered the police's enforcement of lockdown instructions to be excessive.
Passed in September, the bill was explicitly framed by the current justice minister, Dominika Švarc Pipan, as an effort to make up for the excesses of pandemic policing under the previous government – or as she put it, "the injustices that were committed against citizens through the abuse of criminal law and unconstitutional and excessive encroachment on human rights".
Like many nations around the world, Slovenia saw protests against some of its stricter pandemic measures, and not just from relatively extreme anti-vaccine groups.
Among the measures introduced by the right-leaning government were restrictions on movement, assembly and a requirement to wear masks outdoors.
In the country's last parliamentary election, held in April 2022, that government was replaced by a centre-left coalition. Among the key issues in the campaign was public alarm at the previous administration's authoritarianism, which many Slovenians worried was taking the country down a path similar to Viktor Orban's Hungary.
On the night of his election, now-prime minister Robert Golob celebrated "a victory that will enable us to take the country back to freedom".
Literally the politicians framed covid policies as anti freedom. See them for what they are.
Merry Christmas Slovenia. Thank you for another piece of great news to share over the holidays.
Whether covid or climate or wars that have no peace, it is all the same architects. Your speech is the price your non compliance in their sights. Tell them this Christmas to shove it.
However you celebrate and even if you don't may Joy Hope and Love find you.
Remember how you open a present doesn't matter, it's what's inside that counts. Likewise, in our quest, whether covid, qr code, or cars that stop driving when you disagree with Bill Gates, or heat pumps that turn off when you violate your piece of the internet, it's the same. Maybe it's no, as the place holder or book mark. But that's only an instant in time's relativity. The next is that you turn and move forward with change. Like Slovenia. Freedom is priceless.
Merry Christmas 🎄 ❤
Wow! PTL. Would that something like this can be passed in the USA, Canada, the Great Britain, Australia, New Zealand, and other countries where people’s rights were so severely violated. Perhaps aided by fines on those entities, governmental and non governmental proprietary and NGO which have contributed to the pain. Now THOSE would be some reparations I could get behind!