New government passed test, says Havel

Commenting on the election of a new chairman of the lower house on Thursday, Mr Havel said that if the vote was a test, the new government had passed it. Lubomir Zaoralek of the Social Democrats became chairman after a second vote, seeing off a challenge from current chair Civic Democrat Vaclav Klaus, who stood against Mr Zaoralek to test the cohesion of the new government, which has a majority of one.