"Keep your promises, or we'll toughen up" — Czech police unions plan protest action

On Wednesday, September 30, at 11:59 a protest action by security-service unions will begin outside the police headquarters in Prague: not only police officers but also firefighters, prison guards, customs officers and municipal police will take part. After gathering, participants will march to the Interior Ministry, demanding that pre-election promises to improve service conditions finally be kept.

Not a demonstration, but a "union walk"

The action is organized by the Prague security-services trade union. Organizers deliberately call the event not a demonstration but a "union walk" — to avoid the formal hallmarks of a protest. According to Martin Červenka, the former unofficial spokesman of disgruntled police officers who left the force this spring, "a year has passed since the election, and pre-election promises have once again become taboo."

Preventing the "blue flu"

In the invitation to the action, organizers describe it as a "health walk" — prevention of the so-called "blue flu." That term was used in Poland for mass sick leave taken by police officers protesting low pay. Červenka said he would personally never support such an action, calling it "a betrayal of the mission of the security services," but warned that if the interior minister and the government fail to start the promised changes, the unions "will have to toughen their measures."

Demanding the resignation of police leadership

The unions are demanding the resignation of the current police leadership, which, according to Červenka, either denies the existing problems or hushes them up. From the Interior Ministry and the government, they expect the fulfillment of pre-election promises, the passage of a new law, a personnel and financial audit, the creation of independent oversight mechanisms, a reduction of the bloated management apparatus, as well as an end to transferring civilian employees into service positions and a return to the previous requirements for joining the force.

The government promises a pay rise

Interior Minister Lubomír Metnar (ANO party) announced that over the next three years police salaries will rise by 2,600–2,900 crowns a month, adding up to 8,700 crowns in total. Červenka called this "a move that sells well in the media" rather than a solution to the real problems, and compared the initiative to the authorities' promise to issue police 1,500 additional license plates for safety purposes — even though a huge number of the plates already in stock remain unused.

Two years without change

Two years ago it was Červenka who first spoke publicly about the shortage of staff in the Czech police: stations being closed, patrols unable to reach calls in time, and pressure on officers who were required to issue a certain number of fines to meet quotas. He says that since then nothing has changed — the pressure on officers continues, only now it is harder to prove.

Červenka left the police in May, saying the pressure had become unbearable. He claims the system was used to try to silence him, and named specific people responsible, but no investigation ever followed. "If everything worked the way it should, an investigation would have taken place. And it probably would have led somewhere that's off-limits," he concluded.

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Around Prague, based on reporting by seznamzpravy.cz