Šťastný: Motorists satisfied with Babiš’s Czech government

A year after the parliamentary election and the formation of the coalition of ANO, SPD and the Motorists, Šťastný, a representative of the Motorists, said the party is “more than satisfied” with the government’s work. According to him, cooperation runs without major problems, and disagreements are settled in the coalition council.

Reshuffle rumours

Speculation about changing ministers has appeared in the media, and Prime Minister Andrej Babiš (ANO) said in spring that changes in the cabinet were possible after a year in power, that is, in December. Šťastný stressed that any change is entirely up to the prime minister and would require amending the coalition agreement and the consent of all three parties. “I haven’t been at a single meeting where this was even hinted at,” he said, calling the information, taken from Deník N, “media noise.”

Šťastný has already denied rumours that he himself could be in line for health minister: “There is no point in commenting on speculation.” He called cooperation with ministers from other parties excellent, although views on certain issues, for example inclusion in the case of Education Minister Robert Plaga (ANO), may differ.

Disagreements over Ukraine

Šťastný claimed that the coalition parties have not yet voted differently on important bills. When it was pointed out that on Thursday SPD did not support the creation of an international commission on compensation for damage caused to Ukraine by Russian aggression, he replied that this was not about “fundamental proposals.” Foreign policy, he said, is run by the government, and its positions are unified: “There is no point in looking for contradictions.”

The local election flop

The Motorists’ result in the municipal elections was modest: the party failed in Prague and Brno, and succeeded only in Ostrava. Šťastný explained that the Motorists are a small party that fielded candidate lists in only about 60 towns and municipalities. In his words, it will take many years to win local elections: rivals have decades-long traditions, and local politicians have spent years opening events and meeting people.

In most regional capitals the party polled around three percent, while in Ostrava success came from people well known in the city, such as Matěj Gregor and Liana Janáčková. Party leader Petr Macinka did not succeed in Prague, but he was only 14th on the list. MP Krňanský, who ran not for the Motorists but for Naši Chrast, won 52 percent, which shows that in local elections people vote “as neighbours.”

The party now needs to build regional structures and look for topics for conservative voters in big cities, which follow a path of liberal politics, like Berlin, Paris or Vienna. “But we had zero seats and now we have more than twenty. I see it as our entry into municipal politics,” Šťastný said. He explained the decision not to run for the Senate by saying that for a party that won 6.77 percent in the Chamber of Deputies election, there is no point in entering Senate races, where one must win more than 50 percent in the second round.

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Around Prague, based on reporting by novinky.cz