Právo: Single party may rule after 2014 elections

Prague, Feb 25 (CTK) - The Czech Republic may follow the example of Hungary and Slovakia, where a single party rules the country, after the 2014 general election that is likely to be clearly won by the Social Democrats (opposition CSSD), Jiri Pehe writes in daily Pravo yesterday.

The right-wing Fidesz crushingly defeated the democratic left and won a constitutional majority in the Hungarian elections in 2010, while Smer-Social Democracy of Robert Fico scored a landslide victory over the fragmented right-wing in Slovakia last year, Pehe recalls.

Both Hungarian Prime minister Viktor Orban and Fico have been ruling the country without coalition partners, he adds.

Due to the disastrous rule of the right-wing government, the Czech Republic is getting close to the Slovak model. Some opinion polls indicate that the Czech Social Democrats (CSSD) might be able to form a majority government after the next year's election, Pehe writes.

If the CSSD does not win a majority in the next general election, its position may be similar to that of the Civic Platform that has been ruling Poland along with its small coalition partner, the Polish People's Party, since the 2007 election, in which it won nearly 40 percent of the vote, Pehe notes.

In all the three above countries of the Visegrad Group (V4) the present political situation has been a result of a collapse of one part of the political spectrum. While in Hungary and Poland the post-communist left has completely disintegrated and the right wing has been ruling without any strong leftist opposition, in Slovakia it is the right wing that has broken apart, Pehe writes.

The Czech Republic that boasted in the past that it was a political and economic vanguard of the Visegrad Group, might follow its neighbours on the road to a one-coloured government or a strong party assisted by a small coalition partner, he says.

A lot may still happen before the next general election, however, the Czech right wing and especially the senior government Civic Democratic Party (ODS) is in such a poor state that there seems to be nothing that might prevent a future strong government of the CSSD, aside from possible internal disputes between the CSSD leadership and supporters to president-elect Milos Zeman (Party of Citizens' Rights, SPOZ), Pehe points out.

If the CSSD wins a majority position, it will have to voluntarily set limits to itself and respect the democratic rules. The temptation to misuse power may be even stronger because president Zeman is a left winger. The democratic left wing may have a political monopoly in the Czech Republic in the next four years and this monopoly will be further secured by the Communists (KSCM), Pehe writes.

The Social Democrats should take a lesson from the mistakes made by other parties that had nearly absolute control. The majority rule of the ODS at the Prague City Hall triggered off the party's fall on the national level in the past, also due to the corruption scandals mostly related to the Civic Democrats in Prague, Pehe says.

The Slovak and Hungarian majority governments did not resist the temptation to gain control over public media. Moreover, Orban's government even started amending the Hungarian constitution and the election law in order to maintain power. As a result, the political atmosphere in both Hungary and Slovakia is rather stifling, Pehe writes.

But the CSSD may be inspired by Poland, he adds.

Pehe says the government of Donald Tusk, backed by President Bronislaw Komorowski, has been using its strong position to introduce reasonable reforms and follow constructive pro-European politics.

The international prestige and economic situation of Poland have markedly improved in the recent years in spite of the crisis in Europe, Pehe writes.

Poland is showing the art of good government in a situation where a strong cabinet might be led astray by the temptation to abuse power, he says.

Let us hope that the CSSD would perform its government role highly responsibly, too.

In the past, political power sometimes unfortunately aroused political instincts and activated persons in the CSSD that harmed the Czech left wing in the long term, Pehe concludes.