Czech local elections 2026: ANO aims to hold on to its mayors

The ANO movement has announced its goal for the Czech local elections of 2026: to match the result from four years ago, when the party won a majority of mayoral posts in the country's major cities. This was stated by ANO's first deputy chairman, Karel Havlíček, who stressed that the movement remains the strongest political force in the country.

Winning the vote doesn't guarantee power

Four years ago, ANO candidates won in eight of the thirteen regional capitals of Czechia — the exceptions being Prague, Brno, Liberec, České Budějovice, and Plzeň. But as STEM analyst Martin Kratochvíl points out, local elections are among the most peculiar: winning “in votes and percentages” doesn't always translate into real power. What matters far more is the ability to negotiate a coalition with other parties.

In Hradec Králové, for instance, ANO took almost 25% of the vote four years ago but did not join the ruling coalition — the mayor's post is held by Pavlína Springerová of the local movement “Hradec Democratic Club.” In Jihlava, Babiš's movement won by a six-percentage-point margin over the ODS–Christian Democrats (KDU-ČSL) coalition and did join the ruling coalition, but ceded the mayor's chair to ODS candidate Petr Ryška.

Local ANO leader Radek Popelka explains this by the fact that at the time Ryška was leading projects important to the city, and that a mayor's negotiations with ministries tend to be more effective than those of a deputy mayor. At the same time, Popelka stresses: if ANO wins again this year, the mayor's post should go to the winner without exception. The opposite happened in Plzeň, where the ODS–Christian Democrats–TOP 09 coalition beat ANO by just half a percentage point, yet the city's mayor is still ANO's Roman Zarzycki.

Overall, ANO's position among Czechia's statutory cities is favorable: at the last election the party won in 17 of them and secured 13 mayoral posts through negotiations. In Ostrava, however, there was a change — elected mayor Tomáš Macura left ANO and was recalled, replaced by Jan Dohnal of ODS. But the overall number of ANO mayors didn't change: in April 2024, ANO member Jiří Bouška took over the post from ODS's Raduan Nwelati in Mladá Boleslav as part of a scheduled rotation.

The smaller the constituency, the lower ANO's chances of success, Kratochvíl notes: the party's nationwide standing is most visible in large cities and gradually weakens in smaller municipalities, where voters tend to look more at a candidate's personality than at party affiliation, and where purely local movements, rather than parliamentary parties, often run instead. The seriousness of ANO's preparations is also reflected in the growing number of candidates: at the last local elections the party put forward around 6,230 people; this year the figure is already 7,600.

The main battle is for Prague

Babiš's movement traditionally enjoys strong support in the Moravian-Silesian, Ústí, and Karlovy Vary regions. The fight for Prague's city hall, however, promises to be tense: pre-election polls name the STAN party (Mayors and Independents) as ANO's main rival. Analyst Kratochvíl notes that in local elections it's the final stretch of the campaign that proves decisive, and month-out forecasts are often wrong: he advises not writing off the “Spolu” coalition (ODS and TOP 09) either.

“People really start taking an interest in the election only once they have the ballots in their hands. For Prague, I'd generally advise treating month-out models with caution — we ourselves handle this data as carefully as possible,” the analyst explains. ANO's success in the capital will depend above all on post-election negotiations and the results of its coalition partners — SPD and the “Motorists” (Motorists for Themselves).

In the Senate elections the movement is more likely to strengthen its position than to lose ground: it is defending only one seat, but has fielded candidates in 24 districts. Andrej Babiš himself is primarily banking on two districts — Vyškov and Česká Lípa.

Babiš's personal bets: a nurse and the mayor of Česká Lípa

ANO leaders travel most of all through the Vyškov district, campaigning for nurse Petra Absolonová. Her rival is Jan Grolich, governor of the South Moravian Region and leader of the Christian Democrats, seen by the opposition as a possible “great hope.” Babiš promotes Absolonová as a “pure soul” untainted by politics and has built the campaign around her profession. Besides joint campaign trips, he recently invited her onto his podcast, Sorry jako, where he admitted he trusts her enough to let her examine various parts of his own body.

The prime minister's second bet is the Česká Lípa district, where he is counting twice over on the local mayor and MP Jana Volfová: she is defending her own post as head of the city while simultaneously running for ANO in the Senate elections against Liberec governor Martin Půta of the “Mayors for the Liberec Region” movement (SLK). Volfová has headed the city hall since 2018, and both she and Půta enjoy a good reputation in the region, so ANO is testing whether betting on a popular mayor will help it not only hold on to Česká Lípa but also add another Senate seat to the movement's tally.

According to Kratochvíl, in Senate elections the voters of the current opposition are generally more disciplined, and ANO tends to lose ground precisely in the second round. “A candidate's personality matters here too — party affiliation takes a back seat, although it's still important for ANO. What matters most is whether people know the candidate, how they run their campaign, and whether they genuinely go door to door in good faith,” the analyst adds.

What the election outcome depends on

According to Havlíček, personal meetings with voters remain the foundation of ANO's campaign, but that alone isn't enough for success, especially in local elections. “Grassroots campaigning is the basis of our politics, but it isn't enough on its own. The winner will be whoever worked well as a councillor or deputy for four years. It will also help that our government has been active — that we responsibly deliver on our promises,” the politician believes.

The effect could also work in reverse: ruling parties usually have a harder time because of disillusioned voters, and turnout will also have a major impact on the result. In recent years ANO has managed to mobilize supporters largely through countrywide campaign trips — helped by the fact that the movement was in opposition in parliament. “In the Chamber of Deputies elections, the movement managed to mobilize voters amid dissatisfaction with Petr Fiala's government. Now it will become clear whether that effect still works or whether fatigue with its own rule is starting to set in: every government promises something, and some of its voters later become disappointed if the coalition fails to deliver on its promises or abandons them altogether,” Kratochvíl explains.

At the same time, the analyst notes that even some weakening of ANO doesn't necessarily mean defeat. “Local elections are also peculiar in that almost every participant can find an angle from which they look like the winner,” he says, recalling the 2022 elections, when both the “Spolu” coalition and ANO itself declared their results a success.

Read also: Brno: what to see and where to go

Source: seznamzpravy.cz