Financial daily: Czech trade unions plan to sell Prague HQ

Czech trade unions are planning to sell their headquarters in the Czech capital, a building from the 1930s in the Prague-Žižkov neighbourhood, the price of which is estimated at 300 million crowns (around 11.5 million euros), financial daily Hospodářské noviny reported on Thursday.

Czech trade unions headquarters, photo: Dezidor, CC BY 3.0

According to the newspaper, the move is being considered due to the building’s high maintenance costs and investments which were required.

Representatives of the trade unions have yet to take a final decision on the sale of the administrative complex, but the newspaper cited sources as saying the proposal enjoyed sufficient support among union representatives. The unions' property is administered by the Property, Administration and Delimitation Union of the Trade Unions, established after the fall of the communist regime in 1990 as a legal successor to the communist Revolutionary Trade Union Movement.

It administered an enormous property worth billions of crowns then, including administrative buildings and recreational facilities. The organisation gradually sold or transferred those to individual trade unions. At present, the body owns ten buildings, including the headquarters, and two hotels in Prague - the Olšanka and Imperial.

According to Hospodářské noviny, the seat of ČMKOS, the umbrella trade union organisation is not fully used, and also empty offices inside have proven difficult to lease. Not to discourage possible tenants, the unions even removed a huge blue neon sign "The House of Trade Unions" from the top of the building several years ago, the Czech News Agency reported.