Opposition leader Jiří Paroubek says the prime minister must go

Opposition leader Jiří Paroubek, whose Social Democrats scored a resounding victory in the weekend regional elections, has suggested that Prime Minister Mirek Topolánek should be replaced. Speaking shortly after his party’s election triumph, Mr. Paroubek said that Mirek Topolánek was no longer acceptable in the post of prime minister, especially in view of the country’s upcoming EU presidency and that the governing coalition should consider a post-election re-shuffle. The Social Democrats say they will await the outcome of a no-confidence vote in the centre right government on Wednesday, and have made it clear that if the government falls they would be prepared to support a caretaker government to see the country through its EU presidency in the first half of 2009.