Social Democrats reject centre-right coalition

The outgoing prime minister and Social Democrat leader Jiri Paroubek has said that his party has definitively rejected the centre-right coalition of the Civic Democrats, the Christian Democrats and the Greens. The party has called on the Civic Democrats to seek another solution which would guarantee majority support in parliament. Besides, the Social Democrats still want their member to occupy the post of the lower house speaker. On Wednesday afternoon, the party proposed MP Lubomir Zaoralek as their candidate for the post. The centre-right coalition has decided not to field a candidate for Friday's election when the lower house will attempt for the third time to elect a new chairman, six weeks after the general election.

Should the lower house fail to elect a speaker in the near future, the Senate, the upper house of the Czech Parliament, will step in and call for early elections, its chairman warned on Tuesday. Speaking to journalists, Civic Democrat Premysl Sobotka said his party's senators proposed to hold a meeting next month at which the dissolution of the lower chamber will be discussed.