• 09/22/2024

    The flood-ravaged town of Bohumín in the Karviná region is asking the government for help in dealing with the problems brought on by the floods. Electricity supplies from the flooded power station in Pudlov has been restored, but the town is not able to supply heat and hot water to thousands of  inhabitants and the authorities fear they will not able to resolve the problem before the onset of cold weather. Two thirds of the town’s heat and water boiler facilities are reported to have been completely destroyed by the floods.

  • 09/22/2024

    Monday should be clear to partly cloudy with daytime highs between 19 and 23 degrees Celsius.

  • 09/22/2024

    Just over half of Czechs (53 %) are dissatisfied with the current government of Petro Fiala and would welcome its demise, according to the results of a flash poll conducted by Data Collect for Czech Television. Fifty-three percent of respondents would like to see the government resign or fall, and 51 percent would welcome a cabinet re-shuffle. Some 68 percent of respondents think that the results of the regional elections should be reflected in national politics. And 59 percent would also like to see regional elections draw more attention to regional issues.

  • 09/22/2024

    Martin Kuba, the highly popular governor of South Bohemia, who secured the Civic Democratic Party’s victory in the region, has stressed that his victory cannot be ascribed to party politics and criticized the Civic Democrats’  "anti-Babiš" strategy in campaigning. In an interview for Novinky.cz, the South Bohemian governor indirectly criticized Prime Minister Petr Fiala’s leadership of the party, saying that the Civic Democrats could not present as a success the fact that they could by-pass the winner of the elections in some regions and arguing that the party’s "anti-Babiš" strategy in the elections lacked content. “We built our campaign around what South Bohemians are interested in and we got votes from people who would never vote for the Civic Democrats” Kuba said. He said that politics should not be done "against" something, but "for" something. Commentators suggest that Kuba is a serious rival for party leader Petr Fiala.

  • 09/22/2024

    The Pardubice Region has already announced an agreement on a coalition government in the region for the next four years, the CTK news agency reported early on Sunday. It will be governed by a coalition of Martin Netolický’s 3PK regional grouping, ANO, the Civic Democrats, TOP 09 and the Coalition for the Pardubice Region. Under the agreement, Martin Netolický should remain the Pardubice regional governor.

    In other regions, talks are only just getting underway. The ANO party which secured a resounding victory in the elections will be able to govern alone in 3 regions. However, similarly as in the last elections, it may see efforts to by-pass it in other regions.

    Martin Kuba, the highly popular governor of South Bohemia, who secured the Civic Democratic Party’s victory in the region, won by such a wide margin that he does not need to look for a coalition partner.

  • 09/22/2024

    Political commentators say the Pirate Party of the ruling coalition may consider leaving the government and attempting a restart with a new political leadership. The present leadership headed by Deputy Prime Minister Ivan Bartoš  has offered its resignation. The cabinet would survive their departure now, but in the future, it could be a problem for the parties in the governing coalition if the Pirates do not get into the lower house since without them, it might be difficult to form a viable coalition, Josef Mlejnek of the Faculty of Social Sciences at Charles University told the CTK news agency.

    The ANO party faces a similar problem in the persistent lack of potential coalition partners at the national level, Ladislav Mrklas from CEVRO University in Prague. pointed out.

    Pundits contacted by the CTK also expressed the view that after the success of South Bohemian governor Martin Kuba, there may be a shake-up within the ruling Civic Democratic Party, but they do not expect an earthquake in the party in view of the 2025 general elections.

    Commentators also highlighted the success of the Stačilo! (Enough!) coalition which benefitted the Communists and Social Democrats.

  • 09/22/2024

    The opposition ANO party of former prime minister Andrej Babiš has won a resounding victory in the regional elections, winning in 10 out of 13 regions where voting took place. It secured altogether 292 seats on regional councils.

    The ruling Civic Democrats secured 106 seats, the Mayors and Independents got 73. The Christian Democrats won 49 seats, the opposition Freedom and Direct Democracy Party got 32 and TOP 09 won 16 seats. Twenty regional seats went to the Mayors for Liberec, who are affiliated with the Mayors and Independents at the national level.

    The Pirate Party of the ruling coalition took a beating, gaining a mere three seats on regional councils.

    Among the parties outside of the Chamber of Deputies, the Communist Party secured 32 seats on regional councils, the Social Democrats won 13 and regional grouping PRO seven.

    Compared to the election results four years ago, ANO gained the most, winning an additional 114 regional representatives. The Communist Party gained an additional 19 seats, while the Civic Democrats got 7 more.

  • 09/21/2024

    Pirate Party leader Ivan Bartoš has said that in view of the party’s dismal showing in the regional elections the party leadership will offer its resignation at an upcoming party conference which is expected to analyze the reasons for the party’s poor showing. He expressed disappointment with the outcome of the vote, saying that Pirate councilors in the regions had done a lot of good work.  The party leader himself has been under fire in recent weeks over the bungled digitization of the construction permits system.

  • 09/21/2024

    Five senators were elected in the first round of elections, the most since the establishment of the upper house of Parliament. They are:  Jiří Čunek (Christian Democrats) who defended his mandate in the Vsetín region, Petr Vícha (Social Democrats) in the Karviná region and Pavel Fischer (TOP 09) in Prague 12.  Jana Mračková Vildumetzová was elected senator for Sokolov and Martin Bednář (ANO) for Ostrava, who defeated the incumbent senator Leopold Sulovský.

    The two strongest candidates who got under 50 percent of votes will take part in run-off elections next weekend.

  • 09/21/2024

    The opposition ANO party has won a landslide victory in the 2024 regional elections, winning by a big margin in the vast majority of the 13 regions where voting took place. The only regions where the opposition party was beaten was in South Bohemia where the most votes went to the ruling Civic Democratic Party, the the South Moravian Region were the victory went to the coalition SPOLU of Civic Democrats, Christian Democrats and TOP 09 and the Liberec Region where ANO was narrowly beaten by Mayors for Liberec.

    The big surprise in these elections was ANO’s dominant position in Central Bohemia which was expected to go to the ruling parties and the poor showing of the Pirate Party of the ruling coalition in all the regions.

    Despite its convincing victory in most regions, the opposition ANO party of the former prime minister Andrej Babiš, may have problems putting together ruling coalitions in some regions, where it could be ostracized by the liberal democratic parties.

    The results are a wake-up call for the government of Prime Minister Petr Fiala ahead of next year’s general elections.

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