I beg your pardon, Mr President

One of the most controversial aspects of Vaclav Havel's presidency has been his use of the presidential power to pardon. Mr Havel has pardoned around 2,000 people, with some of those cases drawing a great deal of criticism. Now - as his term comes to an end - the president has been defending his actions. In an interview in the weekly newspaper Respekt published today, Mr Havel says that pardons are a question of personal conscience that essentially cannot be discussed. On the other hand, he believes that the power is a leftover from the days of the monarchy, and could be abolished. I spoke to Tomas Klvana, deputy editor-in-chief of the Czech daily newspaper Hospodarske noviny, and asked him to what extent the pardons have tarnished Mr Havel's reputation:

I beg your pardon, Mr President

Vaclav Havel, photo: CTK

"I think that incrementally over time they did tarnish Havel's reputation, and it has to do with the way Czechs are. Czechs are a very egalitarian nation. They don't really have any significant historical elite, and you could even say that their culture has some plebian roots. And, as a result of that, they don't really like this pardoning power, because they see it as a relic of a sort of royal, monarchical system that they though they were done with in 1918. And Vaclav Havel used this power to pardon quite extensively. So you may say that this was one of the reasons for his popularity being tarnished during his presidency. You can also trace a pattern according to which Havel's popularity went down when he used this power extensively."

But there have also been cases where the public has supported the pardons, such as the recent example of the 78-year old man who grew marijuana in his backyard to treat his Parkinson's disease?

"Yes, Czechs are to some extent split on this issue. They also know that the Czech judiciary system is not very good. The Czech judiciary has not undergone any significant transformation after 1989, and Czechs know that quite well. You can wait years for justice to be done if you are waiting for your day in court. So Czechs know on a rational level that Havel's use of the power to pardon was justified, and in some cases they are even willing to admit that. And that includes the case that you have mentioned, and perhaps some other cases as well."