VZCZCXRO9571
PP RUEHAST
DE RUEHPG #0574/01 1461650
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
P 261650Z MAY 06
FM AMEMBASSY PRAGUE
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC PRIORITY 7404
INFO RUEHZL/EUROPEAN POLITICAL COLLECTIVE

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 02 PRAGUE 000574 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SIPDIS 
SENSITIVE 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PGOV PREL EZ
SUBJECT: CZECH ELECTIONS: DECISIVE VICTORY UNLIKELY 
 
REF: A. PRAGUE 284 
     ¶B. PRAGUE 427 
     ¶C. PRAGUE 482 
     ¶D. PRAGUE 516 
     ¶E. PRAGUE 535 
     ¶F. PRAGUE 549 
 
PRAGUE 00000574  001.2 OF 002 
 
 
¶1. (SBU) SUMMARY.  There are a number of trends, and 
idiosyncrasies in the Czech political system that will 
influence the June 2-3 general election, and politics for the 
foreseeable future. These include: (1) the semi-outlaw status 
of the Communist Party, which holds more than 20% of the 
seats in Parliament; (2) the long-term demographic trends 
that make the traditional kingmaker, the Christian Democrats, 
increasingly less relevant; (3) the rootless, fragile 
existence of small liberal parties; (4) the 
under-representation of women in politics, which is one sign 
of a broader public disgust with politics; and (5) the 
electoral rules used in the Czech proportional representation 
system. The result has been political parties that are not 
strongly connected to voters, we well as a series of weak and 
unstable governments.  The elections next month are unlikely 
to break this trend. END SUMMARY 
 
¶2. (U) COMMUNISTS.  The Communist Party of Bohemia and 
Moravia (KSCM) is the only party from the days of 
totalitarian rule in Central Europe to have retained the word 
"communist" in its name.  Antipathy towards the Communists 
since 1989 has meant that mainstream parties would not 
cooperate with them at the national level. But this political 
isolation -- which many Czech reformers thought would 
accelerate the Communists' demise -- has coincided with 
growing support for the party among voters.  In the 1996 
elections KSCM received 22 seats (in the 200-seat lower 
chamber), 24 in the early elections in 1998, and 41 in the 
2002 vote. 
 
¶3. (SBU) One consequence has been that mainstream parties had 
reduced maneuvering room to form a government:  in the 
current parliament, a majority government of 101 seats had to 
be formed from the 159 non-communist seats, meaning 64% of 
the non-communist seats were required. This has contributed 
to the instability of recent coalitions, two of which 
collapsed since the 2002 elections.  Prime Minister Paroubek 
sees a solution in eventually bringing a reformed Communist 
Party into the political mainstream (with Paroubek's 
political calculation likely being that a reformed Communist 
Party would in the end differ little from his CSSD, allowing 
the Social Democrats to eliminate KSCM as a rival).  But for 
the coming electoral term, the KSCM remains unreformed and 
therefore will not be a formal coalition partner for any 
party, including CSSD.  While this will once again mean 
reduced maneuvering space to form a majority coalition, 
Paroubek has altered the playing field by putting on the 
table the option of a minority CSSD government with KSCM 
support -- a step that he believes would support his goal of 
reforming the KSCM and eventually bringing them into the 
mainstream. 
 
¶4. (U) CHRISTIAN DEMOCRATS. One of the small parties that has 
played the role of kingmaker through most of the 
post-communist era is the Christian Democrats (KDU-CSL). But 
this party is increasingly out of step in this overwhelmingly 
secular nation. The Czechs, unlike their neighbors in Poland, 
have the lowest rate of church attendance in the EU; they 
have the highest rate of divorce and the lowest rate of 
childbirth in the EU.  The Social Democrats recently passed, 
with the help of the Communists, a law permitting the 
registration of same-sex partnerships (subsequently vetoed by 
the President).  The Christian Democrats, on the other hand, 
want more state aid for churches, closer ties with the 
Vatican, a ban on same-sex partnerships, and numerous other 
measures that have very little popular support.  In the last 
two elections, the party received just under 10%. But in 
recent pre-election polls, the Christian Democrats are 
drawing between 4 and 8%. The decreasing support for this 
traditional kingmaker means that the major parties will be 
less able to rely on their seats when putting together 
majority governments. 
 
¶5. (U) LIBERALS.  The inability of Czech liberals to organize 
themselves into a sustainable political organization is 
another factor that makes it difficult to form lasting, 
predictable, reliable coalitions. The current liberal party 
in parliament with 10 seats, the Freedom Union (US-DEU), is 
the third member of the current coalition.  It barely 
registers in pre-election polls, and no one expects the party 
will survive this election.  Its demise is largely of its own 
making.  Early this year, when it was clear that the party 
would not get the 5% needed for entry into parliament, or 
even the 3% needed for post-election reimbursement, party 
leaders held a meeting to decide what to do. Some among the 
 
PRAGUE 00000574  002.2 OF 002 
 
 
party said it didn't make sense to waste money on a hopeless 
election and urged the party to "sit this one out," thereby 
saving funds for the local and Senate elections in the fall. 
However, party chair and current Justice Minister Pavel Nemec 
and others decided to give the election a try, but on a 
completely different tack. The "New Freedom Union" was 
launched, and now the coalition member solicits support from 
protesters, anarchists, graffiti artists, consumers of 
marijuana, and those who just "want to live a little or 
completely differently." 
¶6. (U) Two emerging extraparliamentary parties, the Greens 
(SZ) and the Independents/European Democrats (SNK/ED), have 
constituencies similar to the voter base of the original 
Freedom Union, namely well educated, young, urban liberals. 
Freedom Union's demise will make it easier for these two 
parties to cross the 5% threshold for entry to parliament, 
though it's too early to say for certain whether those 
parties will split the vote, or the Greens will capture all 
the attention, as recent polls have indicated. The Greens are 
polling between 4 and 10%. The European Democrats received 
more than 250,000 votes in the June 2004 elections for the 
European parliament, an election Freedom Union did not enter. 
A similar turnout for SNK/ED would put them over 5%.  But, 
particularly in light of the inability of any liberal party 
to survive since 1989, the real question is whether either of 
these new parties, largely untested at the national level, 
will prove to be reliable coalition partners. 
¶7. (U) WOMEN IN POLITICS AND OTHER POPULAR DISAFFECTION. 
Although the Czech Republic is very progressive on many 
issues, women are still dramatically under-represented at the 
highest levels of government. Two explanations are offered. 
The first is that men don't want women in positions of power. 
The second is that Czech politics is a dirty, crooked 
business and that emancipated women, with a wide range of 
choices, would rather do other things. In the current 
government, the Prime Minister and the five Deputy Prime 
Ministers are all men. Only two of the seventeen cabinet 
members are women (Education Minister Petra Buzkova and 
Informatics Minister Dana Berova).  Buzkova is leaving 
politics this summer, though she might run later for the 
Senate. Berova,s ministry will probably be eliminated. Each 
of the 14 regional governors is a man. The major cities all 
have men as mayors. The result, or perhaps the underlying 
cause, is that politics is perceived as horse-trading 
conducted by men in smoky back rooms, and not something 
determined by the publicly-made electoral choices of the 
public, half of which is female. This is one element of 
larger popular dissatisfaction with politics, particularly at 
the national level, which is fed as well by repeated 
corruption scandals. 
¶8. (U) ELECTORAL RULES. Another element creating a distance 
between voters and their elected officials is the 
technicalities of the Czech electoral system. Voters receive 
party lists in the mail days before the election. They take 
the lists to the voting booth, place the list of their chosen 
party into an envelope, and drop the envelope in the ballot 
box. Lists for all other parties are dropped in an adjacent 
trash bin. The voters choose a party, not a candidate. The 
electoral lists are drawn up by local party officials. There 
is no primary system in which voters can have a say in 
determining their candidate. Moreover, the president is 
elected by the members of Parliament, not directly.  Senators 
are the only national officials directly elected. 
¶9. (SBU) COMMENT. None of the factors outline above are new 
(with the exception of PM Paroubek's new stance towards the 
KSCM).  We see no signs that the upcoming elections will 
produce results that will give the Czech Republic a 
government that is either stronger than recent governments 
have been, or one that is better able to connect with its 
citizens.  Rather, as will be discussed further in septel, we 
expect a close election that will be followed by many weeks 
of closed-door negotiations between party leaders and the 
President, the immediate result of which will probably be 
only greater popular disgust with the political process. 
DODMAN