Following years of debate and controversy, construction has gotten underway in Bratislava on the new Slovak national football stadium. The work has been entrusted to Strabag by the project’s investor Ivan Kmotrík, who says the stadium will have a capacity of 22,000 when it opens in 2018. The project will include the construction of a new office building and apartments. The project is being seen as controversial because the state has offered to buy the stadium from Kmotrík upon completion for a price that shouldn’t exceed €75m. At the same time, the government has provided €27.2m in subsidies. Critics point out that no tender for the stadium was ever held meaning that the government has no way of knowing if there were better, cheaper options available to it.
