Babis Kills Coalition Talks – Done Negotiating

Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babis

Prague, Dec 3 (CTK) – More than a half (53 percent) of Czechs believe it was pointless for the election-winning ANO head Andrej Babis to negotiate on forming a coalition government longer than he did, while 38 percent share the opposite view, according to the Kantar TNS agency’s poll released by Czech Television today.

 

ANO won the October 20-21 general election far ahead of the remaining eight parties in parliament.

 

Earlier this week, Babis, the next prime minister, submitted a draft lineup of his minority government to President Milos Zeman.

 

The 15-seat cabinet consists of members of ANO and independent experts.

 

Kantar TNS analyst Pavel Ranoch said voters of the rightist Civic Democratic Party (ODS) and TOP 09 appreciate these parties’ strict refusal of a government cooperation with ANO.

 

On the other hand, the parties whose electorate does not fully approve their post-election steps are mainly the Social Democrats (CSSD) and partly also the Christian Democrats (KDU-CSL), Ranoch said in the discussion programme.

 

The CSSD and the KDU-CSL formed a centre-left government with ANO that emerged from the previous general election and ruled in the past four-year election.

 

ANO has 78 seats in the 200-seat Chamber of Deputies. The other parties in it are the ODS (25 seats), the Pirates (22), the Freedom and Direct Democracy (SPD, 22), the Communists (KSCM, 15), the CSSD (15), the KDU-CSL (10), TOP 09 (7) and Mayors and Independents (STAN, 6).

 

The pollsters also asked the respondents what government coalition they would prefer.

 

More than two fifths of them were unable to answer the question.

 

Eleven percent said they would prefer a government not including ANO.

 

Nine percent would prefer a minority government of ANO, complemented with independent experts, which is a variant chosen by Babis.

 

Five percent would prefer a cabinet comprised of ANO and the ODS, 4 percent want a cabinet of ANO and SPD, while an ANO-Pirates cabinet and that of ANO, the CSSD and the KDU-CSL were each mentioned by 3 percent of those polled.

 

Kantar TNS conducted the poll for Czech Television on 1200 respondents on November 4-24.