Double murder haunts voters in Slovakia
Slovakia votes on Saturday in its first general election since an investigative journalist and his fiancée were murdered in 2018.
The shooting of Jan Kuciak and Martina Kusnirova shocked the nation and toppled PM Robert Fico, but his Smer-SD party remains in office.
Polls are tight, and support has swelled for an ultra-nationalist party.
Kuciak was investigating high-level corruption - and that has become a key issue for voters.
All 150 seats in the national parliament are shared.
The overall election, through proportional representation, follows a presidential vote this past year. Anti-corruption campaigner and legal professional Zuzana Caputova won, despite being a political newcomer.
Four have already been charged over the 2018 murders, including entrepreneur Marian Kocner.
Kuciak was authoring corrupt Slovak businessmen, EU subsidies, VAT fraud and attempts by Italy's notorious 'Ndrangheta mafia to cultivate ties with Slovak politicians.
Who is running?
Prime Minister Peter Pellegrini took office in March 2018. His Social Democrats party (Smer-SD) remain the major in parliament on 48 seats.
But in the wake of the murders, which forced Mr Fico's resignation and caused massive protests in the country, their support has dropped sharply.
Things got worse weekly before the vote when Mr Pellegrini fell sick with pneumonia and cancelled his schedule. The prime minister was forced to take to Twitter and deny he previously coronavirus, after persons online suggested he had the infection.
News site Politico's poll of polls puts Smer-SD on about 17% - down from the 28% vote share they won in the 2016 general election.
Following them in second place will be the centre-right Ordinary People party (OLaNO), which includes seen its popularity soar in recent weeks, because of its anti-corruption agenda. One poll even put them first, 3% above Smer-SD.
Meanwhile the far-right People's Party Our Slovakia (LSNS) has increased to third, polls suggest. The party is led by Marian Kotleba, a guy who used to dress in a uniform modelled on the Hlinka Guard, the militia of the 1939-45 Nazi-sponsored Slovak state.
Mr Kotleba is a fervent nationalist. He wants Slovakia to leave Nato - once calling the military alliance a "terrorist" organisation - and has spouted powerful anti-immigrant and anti-Roma rhetoric.
As the group has denied any links to fascism, it has been regularly accused of extremism.
Polls recommend that fourth and fifth, on 9% each, are centre-left liberal group Progressive Slovakia (PS-SPOLU) and the anti-graft liberal opposition party Za Ludi, meaning FOR FOLKS, led by former president Andrej Kiska.
Even though the governing Smer-SD are ahead, their current coalition partners usually do not look set to win enough votes to qualify for seats, raising further doubts about Smer-SD's grip on power.
