Czech presidential election turns into circus

Feb 10, 2008, 18:41 GMT

Prague - A cluster of reporters was surrounding two Czech lawmakers - a pair distantly resembling the classic comical duo Laurel and Hardy - who claimed to have overheard what must have been a dirty deal.

'He said, we will do it the way you want. Sure. Then he finished and left,' one of the accusers described the actions of a party colleague caught talking to two political rivals.

His party fellow posed for the photographers with a blurred image capturing the trio of alleged dealmakers in what very well could have been an innocent chat.

'This is such a monstrous lie, such incredible dirt,' one of the accused sniped back.

Czech lawmakers on Friday and Saturday failed to produce a new head of state, but they certainly managed to enrage their voters.

Bitter scrambling, undignified spying and a succession of obstructive breaks had filled what should have been a stately event - the joint session of the bicameral parliament at the majestic Prague Castle that had one goal only - to elect a new president.

'This is one of the worst moments of the Czech political class since 1989,' Pravo daily commentator Alexandr Mitrofanov told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa. 'They have shown the worst they could have accomplished.'

Czech lawmakers were choosing between 66-year-old incumbent Vaclav Klaus and Czech-US economist Jan Svejnar, 55, in the first presidential vote that fruitlessly ended Saturday after exhausting all of its three ballots.

While Czech presidents have limited powers, stakes - and emotions - were running high.

The senior ruling Civic Democrats, who seek re-election for their former leader Klaus, say that their failure could shake up the party and even topple their fragile coalition government.

Independent senator Jana Jurencakova feared pressure by opponents so much that she opted to leave Prague Castle in the company of a security unit on Friday night.

'This is my first presidential election. I thought it would be ceremonial. Not such a spectacle,' the tall senator dressed in animal print told dpa.

A full 47 minutes after midnight the Klaus supporter had received a text message from an unknown number.

'Do you sleep, bitch? How much did Klaus pay you?' she quoted from the message, saying, 'Thanks to this message I slept maybe one or two hours last night.'

Three lawmakers had allegedly succumbed to such pressures and fell ill or even collapsed.

'Can we expect someone else to fall sick?' a Czech reporter grilled a Christian Democratic spokesman, as he was explaining how the party's senator disappeared from the highly important session.

Apparently, he was 'somewhere here, in Prague' to take pills, the spokesman said.

In the end, absences in both camps led Klaus to miss re-election by one vote in Saturday's third and last ballot, raising a lot of questions.

'Those people of course found themselves under enormous pressure,' Greens leader and vice premier Martin Bursik told dpa.

His party, which nominated Svejnar, spearheaded the successful push for an open ballot, which is less democratic but would expose potential political corruption.

'They either really have not endured it physically and psychologically, or it is an escape from taking a step, which they can't afford to take out in the open,' Bursik said.

As the election was broadcast live by radio and television, the public could have observed the undignified haggling in full. 'The lawmakers have not realized at all that this is not their ordinary squabbling to which nobody pays attention,' columnist Mitrofanov said.

So what would stop lawmakers from turning the presidential election into a shameful circus? 'Direct vote answers it all,' Bursik said.