A biography of the president-elect

So, after three attempts to elect a successor to former president Vaclav Havel, the new Czech president is Vaclav Klaus. The man who served as prime minister of the Czech Republic from 1993 to 1997 is well known, but internationally he can not yet match the profile of Vaclav Havel.

Vaclav Klaus and his wife Livie, photo: CTK

The man who will become the second president of the Czech Republic, Vaclav Klaus, was born on June 19, 1941, in Prague. He graduated from the Prague School of Economics in 1963, where he studied international economic relations and international trade. Until 1970 he worked as a researcher at the Institute of Economics of the Czechoslovak Academy of Sciences. From 1971 to 1986 he occupied various positions in the Czechoslovak State Bank and later worked at the Centre for Prognostics of the Czechoslovak Academy of Sciences.

During the Velvet Revolution in 1989, Vaclav Klaus joined the Civic Forum and became its leader in October 1990. After its split in 1991, Vaclav Klaus became a cofounder of the Civic Democratic Party, and he remained its chairman until he stepped down in December 2002. From December 1989 until July 1992, Vaclav Klaus served as Finance Minister in the Czechoslovak government.

After the Civic Democrats' victory in the 1992 general election, Vaclav Klaus became prime minister of the Czech government, and he was re-appointed in July 1996. He resigned from the post in November 1997 after his party was rocked by financial scandals. After the early parliamentary elections in July 1998, Vaclav Klaus was elected chairman of the lower house of the Czech Parliament.

Vaclav Klaus has received sixteen honorary doctorates in nine countries; nineteen international awards and has published over twenty books. He is married to economist Livia Klausova, and they have two sons.