Babis Celebrates Pact With Social Democrats

Andrej Babis Jan Hamacek

Prague, May 11 (CTK) – The proposed coalition pact between ANO and the Social Democrats (CSSD) is an acceptable compromise, Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babis (ANO) told journalists today.

 

Now it is up to the Social Democrats to decide in their intra-party referendum on whether to enter the government or not, Babis said.

 

Later today, the ANO deputy group will deal with the proposed coalition agreement, too.

 

The ANO government has been ruling in resignation since it did not gain confidence in the Chamber of Deputies earlier in January.

 

“On our part, there is no problem. I have not seen any discrepancies in the communication within our movement. The party committee clearly asked us to negotiate again with the CSSD. We always did so. Now we will await the CSSD decision,” Babis said.

 

“I am glad that we have somehow finished it. The coalition pact is naturally important, but it is even important that it should work better than under the previous coalition government,” said Babis, who was the finance minister in the previous cabinet, composed of the CSSD, ANO and Christian Democrats (KDU-CSL) .

 

On Wednesday, the two parties’ negotiators agreed on the coalition pact.

 

Babis said the coalition agreement also included an acceptable compromise when it comes to the first-instance conviction of a government member. The CSSD demanded that in such a case, the relevant government member should resign, which was originally rejected by ANO.

 

The feud evidently related to the current criminal prosecution of Babis over an EU subsidy fraud. Babis has dismissed the allegation, calling it a political affair.

 

The two parties eventually agreed that the conviction would put an end to the coalition pact.

 

Babis said the CSSD had dropped its demand that based on the coalition pact, representatives of the anti-EU Freedom and Direct Democracy should be dismissed from their posts in the Chamber of Deputies.