Bratislava: Political newcomer and millionaire Andrej Kiska emerged out of nowhere to win a landslide in Saturday`s presidential run-off, preventing veteran leftist Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico from tightening his grip on power.
A non-aligned centrist who made his fortune in the consumer-credit business, the 51-year-old Kiska will be Slovakia`s first president since independence in 1993 without a past in the Communist party.
"I want to reestablish the people`s trust into the presidential office," Kiska said in a victory speech at his campaign headquarters in the capital Bratislava.
"I want to make the politics more human," said the millionaire-turned-philanthropist who has given away most of his fortune to charity.
Fico, who will likely stay on as prime minister in the runup to a 2016 general election, conceded defeat as results showed Kiska winning a landslide.
"I want to congratulate to Mr. Kiska on becoming the new president of the Slovak Republic," he told reporters at his Smer Social Democratic party headquarters in central Bratislava.
Based on results from 99 percent of voting districts, Kiska had obtained 59.4 percent of the vote while Fico had secured 40.6 percent, the election commission said.
"This election was a referendum on Fico and his government, and he clearly lost it," Grigorij Meseznikov, Bratislava-based analyst from the Institute for Public Affairs told AFP of the premier`s failed attempt to tighten his grip on power.
"A vast majority of voters have expressed their disillusion with Fico, he was unable to mobilise his core voters," he added.
A prospect of Smer winning control of both parliament and the presidency galvanised opponents in the ex-communist country of 5.4 million, which joined the European Union in 2004 and the eurozone in 2009.
Fico`s party has a majority 83 seats in the 150-member parliament, with the next general election scheduled for 2016.
Analysts also warned that if he had taken the presidency, Fico could have tried to amend the constitution to boost presidential powers and transform the parliamentary system into a presidential one.
Crucially, Kiska also sold himself as a bulwark against Fico`s potential monopoly on power."I voted for Kiska to prevent Fico from winning," Denisa Angyalova told AFP as she cast her ballot in a sunny Bratislava, adding: "Fico is too power-hungry and I don`t want one party to rule."
Her sentiments were echoed by pensioner Stefan Horvath: "I voted for Kiska because he is not as corrupted as other politicians. He brings a fresh breath into the politics and he understands people."
Endorsed by heavyweight European Socialists like French President Francois Hollande and European Parliament chief Martin Schulz, veteran leftist Fico, 49, had tried to cast Kiska as politically naive and out of his depth.
But Kiska, 51, capitalised on his image as a political greenhorn untainted by the kond of corruption allegations that have ravaged Slovakia`s right wing.
"Kiska`s number one goal now should be to try to unify a very polarised Slovak society," Bratislava-based analyst Eduard Chmelar told AFP, pointing to the devisive election campaign.
"It`s a new feeling to be voting for myself," said Kiska earlier Saturday as he cast his ballot in his provincial hometown of Poprad, in northern Slovakia.
He has revealed bouts of soul-searching and having "flirted" with Judaism and Buddhism before returning to Catholicism in his autobiography titled "A Manager`s Road from Hell".
But a bid by Fico to paint Kiska not only as an incompetent political novice but also a Scientologist -- a claim Kiska denies -- fell flat with voters.
The incoming president will be sworn in on June 15, when leftist incumbent Ivan Gasparovic`s second term ends.
Driven by the electronics sector and car exports, the Slovak economy is set to expand by 2.3 percent this year.
