Slovenia has found its first female president in a lawyer Natasa Pirc Musar who has links to US former first lady Melania Trump. She has been elected the Balkan country's first female president after beating her conservative rival in a runoff vote.
Musar was in the lead on 53.8 percent of the vote, just ahead of Anze Logar, a conservative veteran, with 46.1 percent votes. Both had run as independents, but popular support rallied around Musar.
She aims to bridge the left-right divide in the country with "open dialogue among all Slovenians".
Colourful Career
Musar has had a wide-reaching colourful career from a TV presenter, to an influential human rights lawyer, and now Slovenia's president. She was a former journalist and presenter on Slovenia's main news programme. Musar had training at CNN and Salford University's media department, completed her PhD in law at Vienna University and was elected Slovenia's commissioner for access to public information in 2004. She also headed the country's data protection authority for a decade.
It should be noted that Musar legally represented Melania Trump, stopping companies attempting to commercialize products with her name during her husband Donald Trump's U.S presidency. She filed a lawsuit in 2016 against Suzy magazine in Slovenia for suggesting that Melania Trump had worked as a high-end escort while pursuing her international modelling career.
During her presidential campaign, Musar vowed to act as a voice for women and provide moral authority in Slovenia, including promoting the country's image as an LGBT haven.
Ceremonial Role
The president is mainly ceremonial in Slovenia's parliamentary system. But Musar wants to change this. She wants to conduct herself differently to the outgoing president Borut Pahor, who rarely intervened in the country's domestic political issues. "I will do my best to be a true president for all, to work for fundamental and constitutional human and democratic rights and democracy," Musar told reporters after winning the election.
