The law that was passed by the former government of Robert Fico preventing health insurance companies from making profit could cost Slovakia dearly as the country is now facing its third arbitration case over the issue. The act put a stop to health insurers making profit, by stipulating that any profit made had to be put into healthcare for their clients. wrote.
An Austrian company European American Investment Bank (Euram) is suing for damages that is claims it incurred after acquiring a 51% stake in Slovak health insurer Apollo Zdravotna Poistovna in 2007 through its Slovak subsidiary EIC. It is basing its claim on an Austrian-Slovak investment agreement, and suing for damages caused by the measures imposed by the government at the turn of 2007/2008, even though EIC sold its share in the company already in 2008.
The Ministry of Finance informed that a similar arbitration case had been rejected in full in October 2009, and it stated that: “The foreign shareholders of private health insurers Dovera and Union are suing Slovakia over the imposed legal obligation of health insurers to use profits for forced investments. Former PM Robert Fico said he was actually looking forward to arbitration with the shareholders of private health insurance companies. He was convinced that the finances that the insurers wanted to retain from paid health insurance were public funds. The new government wants to change this state of affairs, however”.
[…] The court made the ruling on the grounds that the dispute between the shareholder of Dovera health insurer (Dutch company HICEE) and the Slovak Republic is not within its jurisdiction. Slovakia is being sued by the health insurers Dovera and Union, and now also a third insurer in the shape of the shareholder of the Apollo health insurer. […]