[Source: The Ministry of Culture of the Slovak Republic’s website]
191/1994 Coll. Laws
Law
of the National Council of the Slovak Republic of July 7, 1994
ON DENOMINATION OF COMMUNITIES IN LANGUAGE OF NATIONAL MINORITIES
The National Council of the Slovak Republic has adopted the following law:
Article
1
(1) Communities, in which citizens of a national minority form at least 20
% of the population (hereafter only community), are denominated in the language
of the national minority on separate road signs denominating the beginning
and end of a community.
(2) Road signs are placed according to para. 1 under road signs bearing the
name of the community which is always stated in the official language.[1]
(3) The list of the denominations of communities in languages of national
minorities is given in an enclosure to this law; denominations of communities
have a local character.
(4) The Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Slovak Republic will provide by
generally obligatory regulation a road sign for purposes of informative denomination
of communities in languages of national minorities, which will differ from
a road sign with the name of a community.
Article 2
In official relations, especially in public documents, stamps of communities,
cartographic works and postal communications, names of communities are exclusively
in the official language.
Article 3
(1) A community may decide by means of a vote of its inhabitants on changing
the denomination of a community given in an enclosure of this law and may
determine the denomination of the community in the language of a national
minority in this form, if the denomination is not stated in the enclosure
to this law.
(2) Voting according to para. 1 is valid, if
a majority of the inhabitants of a community authorized to vote pursuant to
special regulation took part in it.[2]
The decision of the community according to para. 1 is accepted, if at least
80 % of inhabitants who participated in the voting voted for it in a valid
manner.
(3) Provisions of paragraphs 1 and 2 do not refer to communities whose name
was changed in the period 1867 - 1918 or 1938 - 1945.
Article
4
Bodies of the state administration[3]
are obliged to ensure denomination of communities pursuant to this law.
Article 5
This law comes into effect on the date of its promulgation, with the exception
of Article 4, which comes into effect on November 1, 1994.
Michal Kovác in his own hand
Ivan Gašparovic in his own hand
Jozef Moravcík in his own hand
_________________
| [1] | Article
3 of Law of the Slovak National Council No. 517/1990 Coll. on territorial
and administrative division of the Slovak Republic. Article 3.4 of Law of the Slovak National Council No. 428/1990 Coll. on the official language in the Slovak Republic. |
| [2] | Article
4.2 b) of Law of the Slovak National Council No. 369/1990 Coll. on communal
establishment. Article 2 of Law of the Slovak National Council No. 364/1990 Coll. on elections to self-administration bodies in the wording of subsequent regulations. |
| [3] | § 48 of the Decree of the Federal Ministry of Internal Affairs No. 99/1989 Coll. on rules of road traffic in the wording of subsequent regulations. |