Prague, Feb 17 (CTK) – Czech Social Democrat (CSSD) leader Bohuslav Sobotka can see no sense in opening a debate on the party’s old resolution banning cooperation with the Communists (KSCM) at the forthcoming CSSD election conference next month, he told journalists Friday.
A cooperation of the two left-wing parties is possible, said Sobotka who is also prime minister.
“There is nothing bad about the fact that left-wing parties are considering their possible cooperation. After all, the CSSD has been cooperating with the KSCM for a long time in the self-rule governments of many regions,” he said.
If the CSSD planned a government coalition with other parties, these parties would have to respect the pro-European course of the Czech Republic and its relations with allies, Sobotka said.
“The CSSD supports the memberships of the EU and NATO and we will want the next government to be clearly based on these parameters,” he said.
The Communists want a referendum on the Czech membership of NATO to be held. KSCM leader Vojtech Filip said previously the party is not going to change its politics.
The Bohumin resolution from 1995 bans the CSSD from political cooperation with several extremist parties, all of them have turned marginal since, except for the KSCM.
A group of Social Democrats from the Plzen Region would like to open a debate on the scrapping of the Bohumin resolution.
CSSD MP Marie Benesova said similar considerations regularly opened before the party’s conferences. She said Sobotka has always taken a reserved position to cooperation with the Communists, but this has suddenly changed. “This tactics of his indicates that the conference will definitely be important,” Benesova said.
CSSD MP Jaroslav Foldyna, a representative of the traditionalist, unionist camp in the party, said the resolution is obsolete. He said the left-wing parties must cooperate in pushing through higher salaries and pensions in the country and defending fundamental social rights.
CSSD MP Jan Chvojka, new Minister for Human Rights, said the party conference should talk about its new long-term programme and the forthcoming general election rather than about an outdated resolution. The time to discuss possible government coalitions will come after the election, he said.
CSSD senator Jiri Dienstbier, known for his liberal positions, shares Chvojka’s view.
“Apart from the election result, the current political attitudes of the individual parties should be crucial for post-election alliances,” he told CTK.
President Milos Zeman, who led the CSSD in the late 1990s and early 2000s, said he believed the resolution should be cancelled by a party congress because a party congress had passed it.
