Czechia - 2017 Parliamentary Election
In May 2017 the electoral campaigns ahead of the parliamentary elections and the January 2018 presidential election escalated into a serious clash between the three most important politicians in the country: the prime minister and chairman of the Czech Social Democratic Party (CSSD), Bohuslav Sobotka; the deputy prime minister, finance minister and leader of the ANO movement, Andrej Babiš; and President Miloš Zeman. This clash led to a series of chaotic moves by the prime minister on the resignation of the government, and a constitutional dispute between prime minister and president.
The list of allegations Sobotka made against Babiš is long: starting from doubts as to the sources of his wealth, via immoral or illegal methods of tax evasion, and suspected fraud while applying for EU grants (this case is being examined by OLAF, the European Anti-Fraud Office), to the use of the media to fight his political opponents (including ministers in the coalition).
These allegations had been repeated for at least a year, and are rooted in the conflict of interest which Babiš has found himself in since 2014, as finance minister, the owner of the agro-chemical company Agrofert, and of a range of influential media outlets. In January 2017 Babiš’s business assets were handed over to a trust fund; however, that trust fund is co-managed by the deputy prime minister’s partner Monika, whom he was planning to marry.
The government crisis in the Czech Republic resulted from the row between Zeman and his political rival Prime Minister Bohuslav Sobotka over the suspected tax evasion by Finance Minister Andrej Babis. On May 2, Sobotka who has been leading the country’s coalition government since 2014, announced the resignation of his cabinet over the disagreement with Babis whose entrepreneur activities were considered by Sobotka undermining the government's authority.
On 05 May 2017, Sobotka reversed his decision to resign but called on Zeman for Babis dismissal. The proposal was rejected by the president prompting about 20,000 people to rally against the decision in the Czech capital of Prague. On May 10, Zeman held talks with the leaders of the three parties that make up the coalition, in an attempt to end the political standoff. According to media reports, the leaders expressed readiness to stay in power until the general election set for October 20-21.
On 21 October 2017 billionaire businessman Andrej Babis and his ANO (short for Action of Dissatisfied Citizens) party came away with the lion's share of the votes, taking 29.6 percent of the vote and coming first in all the country’s constituencies, and outpacing their nearest rivals by nearly 3-1. The result was considerably higher than the 18.65 percent the grouping received in the last elections four years earlier and left ANO on 78 seats. Turnout was 60.8 percent, a very slight rise on the figure for 2013.
Still, it was a banner day for insurgent parties, two of whom had especially strong showings. The billionaire businessman Andrej Babis would become the Czech Republic's next prime minister after his centrist ANO party won 29.6 percent of the vote, or 78 seats in the 200-seat lower house of parliament. Establishment parties balked at joining a government with a potential prime minister who is under criminal investigation, while the insurgent parties remained something of a wild card. TOP 09 and the Mayors group reached the five-percent threshold for entrance to the lower house by the skin of their teeth, with 5.3 and 5.2 percent respectively.
The center-of-right Civic Party, once the dominant conservative party in Czech politics came in at a distant second with a little more than 11 percent of the vote, and 25 seats in parliament. The left-of-center, anti-establishment Pirate Party surged into parliament with 10.8 percent of the vote, followed closely by the far-right nationalist Freedom and Direct Democracy party (another newcomer to parliament) with 10.6 percent. Each party would likely hold 22 seats.
Despite a booming economy featuring healthy economic growth, low unemployment and wage growth, the ruling left-of-center Social Democratic Party was pummeled at the polls, winning just 7.3 percent in their worst showing since the break-up of Czechoslovakia in 1993. They held 50 seats in the outgoing parliament but are likely to have just 15 in the next legislative session. They appear to have been done-in by anti-immigrant and anti-Islam anxiety, as well a healthy dose of euro-scepticism on the part of the public.
It seems that a third of the electorate did not mind the fact that Babiš faced criminal charges and they took his word that he was simply the victim of a witch hunt. This is troubling because in most democratic countries it would probably be a significant factor in deciding whom to vote for. It is troubling, because this factor will play an important role and it will be discussed internationally again and again. In foreign media reports about the Czech elections this piece of information will be one of the main issues readers or viewers will receive: the Czech Republic will probably be headed by a prime minister who is criminally prosecuted.
Babiš was able to pull over voters from his coalition partners –especially the Social Democrats – but in a more general way the loser was the Czech Left, because the outcome for the Social Democrats and the Communists which had played an important role in Czech politics since the beginning of the 1990s was a huge defeat. And it may actually signal that the Czech Left, the post-communist Left, is on the way out just like in Hungary or in Poland. In general the anti-system parties are the winners, because it is not just ANO, but also the Pirates and the Party of Direct Democracy of Mr. Okamura as well as the Communists, although support for them is lower than they expected.
The government of the Social Democrats, ANO, and the Christian Democrats, led by Prime Minister Bohuslav Sobotka, which tendered its resignation, was not without its successes over the last four years, overseeing a growing economy. Its success did not help the senior Social Democrats, however, the biggest casualty in the October election, but ANO. Andrej Babiš was able to portray himself as the main person behind the success of the government, even when it was the Social Democrats who were pushing some of the reforms and for positive changes. The public saw it as his success.
The Civic Democrats, the Christian Democrats, TOP 09 and the Mayors and Independents formed a group called Democratic Bloc with a view to taking a common position when the first session of the new Chamber of Deputies is held. The parties said that they would not vote for ANO’s Radek Vondrácek as speaker of the lower house and would demand two deputy speakers posts and the leadership of seven committees. On 19 December 2017, the newly-appointed minority government of Prime Minister Andrej Babiš approved its policy program. Lower taxes, higher wages, an overhaul of the pension system, faster digitalization of the state sector and an active foreign policy based on the country’s membership in the EU and NATO – there’s not a lot that one can argue with in the new government’s policy program. However Prime Minister Andrej Babiš was clearly aware of the fact that his government’s chances of winning a vote of confidence in the lower house are practically non-existent.
However it was not the priorities of the policy program as such that the remaining parliamentary parties have a problem with. What they have strong reservations to is how this minority government emerged and the fact that the man at its head has been charged with EU subsidy fraud and the lower house is due to vote early next year on whether to strip him of his immunity and open the way for prosecution.
With the exception of the Communist Party which indicated it might be willing to support or tolerate the government under certain conditions, all other parliamentary parties have given Babiš’ government of ANO members and unaffiliated experts, the thumbs down. There is general dissatisfaction with the fact that the winning party failed to make a real effort to put together a majority government, which would have meant Andrej Babiš relinquishing his ambition to head the cabinet. Opposition parties left and right of center said that a government without a vote of confidence should refrain from making far-reaching decisions and adopt a caretaking role in office. However Andrej Babiš has made it clear he had no intention of respecting that appeal.
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