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Current AffairsA look back at the pre-election campaigns
Many pundits in the Czech Republic agree that this year's pre-election
campaigns were - at least as far as the country's two largest parties were
concerned - among the most aggressive in recent memory, the ruling Social
Democrats and their opposition rivals the Civic Democrats vying for Czech
votes. It is widely expected that one of these parties will form the
country's next government. The campaign season was of course not just
about those two - or their leaders Jiri Paroubek and Mirek Topolanek. But,
in a way it might as well have been. More
Current AffairsGeneral elections just hours away
Less than twenty-four hours before polling stations open for general
elections the two strongest parties on the Czech political scene - the
ruling Social Democrats and the opposition Civic Democrats - are running a
very tight race. Although it is not clear which of them will be first past
the post it is almost certain that neither will win enough votes to set up
its own majority government. Coalition and consensus is the name of the
game on the Czech political scene and political analysts are already
debating the pros and cons of various coalition scenarios.
More
Talking PointJiri Paroubek and Mirek Topolanek: who are the front-runners in the race for Czech Prime Minister?
Polls have them running neck-and-neck days before the elections. Jiri
Paroubek, the current Prime Minister and leader of the Social Democratic
Party, and Mirek Topolanek, the leader of the opposition Civic Democratic
Party. One of these two men is most likely to be the Czech Republic's next
Prime Minister, but who are they and where did they come from? In this
week's Talking Point we take a look at these two men and the images they
project.
More
Current AffairsPrime minister & opposition party leader face off in important debate
The Czech Republic is now days away from a general election that will
decide on the country's next government: in all likelihood led either by
the Social Democratic Party, that has ruled for the last eight years, or
their rivals - the right-of-centre Civic Democrats. The race is far from
decided and even two final opinion polls have predicted opposite results:
one giving the Social Democrats a slight edge, the other predicting a
decisive Civic Democrat victory. Clearly, final televised debates between
the parties' two leaders - Prime Minister Jiri Paroubek and opposition
leader Mirek Topolanek - could still have an impact. More
Current AffairsCzech politicians come to blows two weeks ahead of parliamentary elections
It was a resounding slap that reverberated for hours after it had been
dealt. At a meeting of Czech dentists on Saturday Miroslav Macek, a former
deputy prime minister in the 1990s and long time adviser to President
Vaclav Klaus, walked over to Health Minister David Rath and without
warning hit him on the back of the head, starting a fistfight. Macek
claims he was settling a personal score with the minister because of
insulting remarks he'd made about his wife, but the nature of the attack -
at the start of a conference with TV cameras rolling - suggested otherwise.
The incident came less than a fortnight before parliamentary elections in
the midst of what commentators have described as the most aggressive
election campaign in the country's modern history.
More
Current AffairsJohn Major speaks in Prague on Czech public-private partnerships
Public-private partnerships, which promote cooperation between the state
and the private sector, have met with success worldwide. In the UK, for
example, such projects have invited investments worth 70 billion Euros (2
trillion Czech crowns), and developing countries have also benefited from
the model. On Wednesday a discussion took place in Prague on how
public-private partnerships, or PPPs, could benefit the Czech Republic.
The most prominent guest was former British Prime Minister Sir John Major,
the man commonly regarded as pioneering the idea. More
