Prague, Oct 4 (CTK) – The Pirates would rule the Czech Republic if secondary school students were to decide on the lineup of the next government, the fresh results of the simulated general election that the People in Need organisation provided to CTK showed two weeks before the real election date.
According to the simulated election in which 40,068 students aged over 15 from 281 schools participated, the extra-parliamentary Pirates would score a clear victory with 24.5 percent of the vote, winning two times more than the following ANO movement (11.9 percent) or the right-wing TOP 09 (11.8 percent).
Four other parties would also enter the lower house of Czech parliament: Freedom and Direct Democracy (SPD; 7.8 percent), the Greens (6.3 percent), the right-wing Civic Democrats (ODS; 6.1 percent), and the Athletes movement (5.2 percent).
The simulated elections showed that the Pirates are the most popular party at grammar schools as well as secondary vocational schools and apprentice schools.
On the other hand, some mainstream parties are rather unpopular among students who would not let them enter parliament – the senior government Social Democrats (CSSD; 2.5 percent), the senior opposition Communists (KSCM; 3.3 percent) and the junior government Christian Democrats (KDU-CSL; 3.5 percent).
Among grammar school students, TOP 09 of Karel Schwarzenberg and Miroslav Kalousek is more popular than ANO of billionaire Andrej Babis, and the Greens are more popular than the SPD of the populist Tomio Okamura. Apprentice school students prefer Babis, Okamura and the Athletes, and the extremist Bloc against Islamisation, The Reasonable – Stop Migration and EU dictate and the Communists are more popular among them than TOP 09, the ODS and the Greens.
“It will be possible to compare the results of the student elections with those of the real elections soon. They will clearly be different. However, the simulated student elections seem to indicate a trend in the voter preferences,” said Karel Strachota, from People in Need.
The simulated general election was held on October 3-4.
The real election is due on October 20-21. Opinion polls indicate that ANO is its clear favourite, that the CSSD, the KSCM, the ODS and the SPD are very likely to enter parliament, and that TOP 09, the Pirates and the KDU-CSL have a big chance to succeed as well.
In the simulated student elections held shortly before the 2013 general election, TOP 09 won closely ahead of the Pirates. The students would also have given parliamentary seats to four other parties – ANO, the CSSD, the ODS and the far-right Workers’ Party of Social Justice (DSSS) then.
The simulated regional elections held a year ago showed that the Pirate Party was the most popular among students, followed by the projects of Babis, Schwarzenberg and Okamura.
People in Need has been organising the simulated student elections since 2010 in order to motivate young people to be interested in politics.
