President asks Gross to begin talks on forming new government

President Vaclav Klaus has asked the acting leader of the Social Democrats, Stanislav Gross, to begin talks on forming a new government. Mr Gross is hoping to build a coalition with the same two centre-right parties who were in government with the Social Democrats under his predecessor Vladimir Spidla; he resigned last weekend in the wake of poor results in elections to the European Parliament.

However, Mr Gross must find at least one extra vote to secure a majority in the Chamber of Deputies before the president will appoint him prime minister. The previous coalition had a majority of one in the 200-seat lower house, but one MP from the smallest party, the Freedom Union, has joined the opposition and another has announced he is going to follow suit.

In the meantime, a former member of the opposition Civic Democrats has allied himself with the Freedom Union.

Newspaper reports on Friday suggested that Mr Gross, who is 34, would try to win the support of MPs from the opposition benches in order to gain a majority.

Speaking to journalists on Friday, President Klaus said the new government should offer more than just the replacement of a few faces. He said the Czech people were expecting them to deliver change.