Prague, Aug 22 (CTK) – The Czech Pirate Party (CPS) plans to run in all regions in the regional election to be held in the autumn of 2016 with the aim to gain at least one seat in each assembly, its chairman Lukas Cernohorsky told CTK at the party’s forum in Prague Saturday.
The forum is CPS’s supreme body, an equivalent of the party’s congress.
The Pirates will run solo in most regions, only in some of them they may ally with other parties or movements, Cernohorsky said.
The CPS’s campaign for the regional election should have three parts.
First, the party will focus on its introduction to the public.
“Many people do not understand our name yet. They imagine that we are something like bandits. There is also a myth describing us as a mere IT crowd. Many suppose it is still rather a practical joke. However, in some towns it is apparent that we really mean it,” Cernohorsky said.
The other parts of the CPS’s campaign will explain the party’s programme and present its election candidates.
The CPS members are to approve the programme in the autumn. The list of candidates should be completed next May or June.
If the Pirates succeeded in the regions, it would like to play the role of “a constructive opposition” promoting the offices’ openness and a better access to information, Cernohorsky said.
The forum was attended by some 59 members, while others were following it on the Internet. The delegates were debating a technical change to the statutes and the annual financial report.
The forum did not elect a new leadership. It should be elected next autumn. However, the party will be probably choosing its leaders in the spring to prevent a change in its helm from disturbing the preparation for the regional election.
The CPS was established in 2009, being inspired by foreign Pirate parties. It has 432 members and 4220 registered supporters.
In the election to the Prague Assembly last year, the Pirates gained four seats out of 65. The party has 29 representatives at town halls and fills the post of mayor in Marianske Lazne, west Bohemia.
Libor Michalek, a joint candidate of the Pirates, Greens and Christian Democrats (KDU-CSL), was elected to the Senate, the upper house of parliament in 2012. The CPS is not represented in the Chamber of Deputies, the lower house.
In the previous election to the Chamber of Deputies in 2013, the CPS gained 2.66 percent of the vote and in the 2014 election to the European Parliament (EP), it won 4.78 percent.
