Zuzana Čaputová
Zuzana Čaputová was for over ten years at the forefront of a public campaign against permission for an additional landfill that would have aggravated soil, air and water pollution in the town and its environs. For her leadership of this campaign, Zuzana Čaputová was awarded the prestigious Goldman Environmental Prize in 2016. She is the author or co-author of several publications and a fellow of the Environmental Law Alliance Worldwide (ELAW).
In December 2017, she announced her intention to join the political party Progressive Slovakia and in January 2018, she was elected its deputy leader. In May 2018, she announced that she would run for the presidency of the Slovak Republic with the aim of restoring trust in Slovak society and rekindling the strength and meaning of the values that unite Slovak society – justice, the protection of human dignity and Slovakia’s alignment with democratic Europe. One of the factors that influenced her candidacy was the murder of a young journalist and his fiancée in February 2018.
She was elected president of the Slovak Republic in the second round of the presidential election on 30 March 2019. She resigned from Progressive Slovakia in May 2019. She is not currently a member of any political party. She took up her office after her inauguration on 15 June 2019.