Money left on MEP's election account goes to NGO, family

Prague, Feb 19 (CTK) - Unsuccessful Czech presidential candidate Zuzana Roithova will give 40,000 crowns that remain on her transparent election account after her campaign to a group helping deafblind people and a family that takes care for five children in need, she wrote on her Facebook profile Tuesday.

Roithova said the sums are not high but she wanted to point to the work of these two recipients, the Club of Friends of the Red and White Cane and the family with children that helps other kids who lost their home.

The white cane with two red bands is used by deafblind persons.

Under Czech law, the money that the presidential candidates receive from sponsors and do not spend on their campaign should be given to charity. Roithova is the first candidate to name the recipients of the surplus money.

Roithova, a European Parliament member for Czech Christian Democrats (KDU-CSL), raised 715,000 crowns from 241 donors for her campaign, which is a relative small sum.

She said she did not want to use money from her party or from big companies.

Roithova won nearly 5 percent of the vote in the first round of the direct presidential election in January, being the sixth most successful of the nine candidates. Former socialist prime minister Milos Zeman (Party of Citizens' Rights, SPOZ) beat Foreign Minister Karel Schwarzenberg (TOP 09) in the runoff election.