Under the Act on the Association of Citizens (Act No. 83/1990 Coll. on the Association of Citizens, as amended), civic associations are legal entities. State authorities may interfere with their status and activities only within the limits of the law. Associations may therefore act in their own name and on their own account, which means they can enter into contracts, manage and dispose of their assets, conclude employment contracts and agreements as employers, accept donations and perform many other legal acts.
An association comes into being upon registration with the Ministry of the Interior of the Slovak Republic. Under the law, and in line with the constitutional right of free association, the Ministry is obliged to register every civic association that meets the statutory conditions and requirements. The Ministry therefore cannot decide arbitrarily, without giving reasons, whether or not to register an association.
An application to register a civic association must be submitted by at least three citizens, at least one of whom must be over 18. These three citizens form the association’s preparatory committee, which signs and submits the application and the articles of the civic association to the Ministry of the Interior of the Slovak Republic. Both documents are mandatory for registration, together with payment of the administrative fee, which currently stands at EUR 66.
By law, the articles of an association must contain:
a) the name of the association (which must not be identical to the name of any existing legal entity). An association may also call itself a society, club, movement, group, etc.
b) the registered office of the association (its exact address, which will also be entered as the registered office in the register of civic associations kept by the Ministry)
c) the objectives of the association (the law does not specify precisely what an association’s objectives must be, but sets out in negative terms what they may not be)
d) the bodies of the association, how they are constituted, and which bodies and officers are authorised to act on its behalf (the law leaves it to the members to decide which bodies to create and what to call them, as well as how they are formed, composed and operate; it does, however, assume that the association will create certain bodies with decision-making powers within it)
e) provisions on organisational units, if any are established and if they are to act in their own name (an association may have branches that act in their own name; in such cases, however, the articles must set out precisely the relationships and powers between the branches themselves and between the branches and the association’s headquarters.)
f) the principles of financial management (the law does not specify this requirement in detail. In most cases, this part of the articles sets out the association’s possible income and expenditure, how its assets are to be managed, and so on. The articles may also provide for the association to carry on income-generating activities. Importantly, however, such activities must not be the association’s main activity and should serve only to support its proper running (examples include income from participation fees for the association’s events or charges for promotional materials).
g) the scope of members’ rights and obligations (again, it is entirely up to the association how it regulates this area)
For transparency and the proper running of the association, it is also advisable for the articles to specify the procedure for dissolving the association and how its property will be dealt with afterwards (many foreign foundations, for example, require the articles to state expressly that, on dissolution, all the association’s assets will pass, by decision of the relevant body, to another organisation for the pursuit of public-benefit objectives).
Once the above requirements are met, the conditions for registering the association are satisfied. It is then entirely up to the members which further relationships and procedures they set out in the articles. Within its remit, the Ministry may not demand changes to matters not governed by law, nor restrict members in making further amendments and modifications.
The articles must be accompanied by an application to register the civic association, which must include the names, surnames, birth registration numbers, addresses and signatures of the members of the preparatory committee. The application must also state which of the signatories is the authorised representative entitled to act on their behalf (the representative must be over 18). This application, together with two copies of the articles and payment of the administrative fee, is then submitted for registration to the Ministry of the Interior of the Slovak Republic.