TOP09 election gimmick goes wrong

The right-wing TOP09 party faces criminal complaints over an election gimmick that went wrong. In an effort to emphasize the grave state of the country’s public finances, the party sent thousands of people in the Czech Republic mock bills asking them to pay their share of the public debt –amounting to 121 thousand crowns – without delay. Friday’s papers report that many senior citizens were shocked and upset by what they thought was an authentic payment slip and one elderly woman required psychiatric attention. Two thousand people are reported to have called emergency help lines and the police have confirmed receiving dozens of criminal complaints relating to fraud and scaremongering.