AS A political newcomer Alenka Bratusek has been thrown in at the deep end. A deputy for a year and prime minister for just three weeks, fate has dumped the worst crisis since Slovenia’s independence in 1991 in her lap. After Cyprus the question is whether her country will be next in the euro zone to need a bail-out. No, she says firmly. “We don’t need help. We just need time.”

Ms Bratusek was speaking a day after the OECD rich-country club released a devastating report that talked of a deep recession and prolonged downturn, what it calls “weak prospects” for the economy and “mismanagement” of the country’s large state-owned banks. Yves Leterme, the senior OECD official presenting the report in Ljubljana, said that he had “no reason” to expect that Slovenia had “an immediate need for a bail-out.” That, however, clearly means he is not ruling it out for the future.

Last year GDP fell by 2.3% and this year it is likely to shrink by 2.1%. Unemployment could reach 9.7%, over twice as high as in 2008 (just after Slovenia joined the euro). The population is ageing. Almost 50% of GDP comes from exports, many of them to troubled neighbours such as Italy. Even so Slovenes are cross that the spotlight has turned to them after the Cyprus crisis, with ten-year bond yields spiking close to 7%.

Ms Bratusek insists that “we are absolutely not Cyprus.” Bank assets in Slovenia, she points out, amount to 130% of GDP, against 800% in Cyprus. Yet she concedes that the banks are her “number one problem.” The real trouble comes from the biggest banks, which are still in state hands. In a small country of 2m, everyone at the top knows everyone else. For years bankers have lent large sums to their friends, many of whom used the cash to buy companies they ran, using the assets as collateral. Many such businesses have now collapsed. The OECD report concludes starkly that the equity of the state banks has been “virtually wiped out.” The six biggest state-controlled banks represent 58% of all lending in Slovenia. A shocking 15% of total loans are now non-performing, the third-highest ratio in the euro zone.

Facing a cut in living standards, angry Slovenes took to the streets last December. That has since prompted the downfall of Janez Jansa, then prime minister, and Zoran Jankovic, who resigned as head of the largest opposition party. Both had been called to account by Slovenia’s anti-corruption watchdog. Something has changed in the country, says Gorazd Kovacic, a sociologist, and “it is irreversible”. Ms Bratusek agrees.

Long-delayed pension reforms and the establishment of a “bad bank” have at last begun, but Slovenia’s squabbling politicians have left it very late before acting. “We have started, we will go on,” promises Ms Bratusek.