Lany, Central Bohemia, Nov 14 (CTK) – The Czech Christian Democrats (KDU-CSL) are going to opposition, their chairman Pavel Belobradek confirmed after a meeting with President Milos Zeman on Tuesday, criticising the election-winning ANO for neither holding government-forming talks nor proposing the new lower house’s lineup.
“We keep to our decision to switch to opposition, because the basic conditions [for our government entry] remain unfulfilled and we have not been invited [to join a government] either,” Belobradek, whose centrist party is a junior partner in the outgoing centre-left government, told reporters.
By insisting on forming a minority one-colour government and clinging to the post of prime minister, ANO chairman Andrej Babis has blocked any further negotiations, Belobradek said.
“We do not find this constructive,” he said.
The KDU-CSL would find a semi-political or caretaker government as an acceptable variant to remove the current stalemate, he said.
The KDU-CSL previously said they would not join a government headed by a prosecuted person.
Babis faces criminal prosecution for a suspected EU subsidy fraud.
Belobradek said ANO has not submitted any proposal for the lineup and personnel filling of posts in the new Chamber of Deputies as yet, though the Chamber’s constituent session will start on November 20.
The decision on the Chamber’s arrangement has also been thwarted by the fact that it is not clear who will join the coalition and who will be in opposition, either open or latent, Belobradek said.
The KDU-CSL wants Babis, the probable new prime minister, to say who he will ask to support his cabinet in the Chamber’s vote of confidence, Belobradek said.
