Czech Republic: Pro-Russia Zeman wins Czech Republic election

The Czech Republic's pro-Russia president won a second five-year term Saturday after beating a political newcomer viewed as more Western-oriented in a runoff vote.

With ballots from almost 99 percent of polling stations counted, the Czech Statistics Office said President Milos Zeman had received 51.6 percent of the vote during the two-day runoff election.

His opponent, former Czech Academy of Sciences head Jiri Drahos, had 48.4 percent.
Mr Drahos conceded defeat and congratulated Mr Zeman on Saturday afternoon. The career scientist and chemistry professor said he planned to stay in politics, but did not provide details.
"It's not over," Mr Drahos said.

Mr Zeman, 73, a veteran of Czech politics and former left-wing prime minister, won his first term in 2013 during the Czech Republic's first presidential election decided by voters, not lawmakers.

Read more: Czech Republic: Pro-Russia Zeman wins Czech Republic election  

The Czech Republic’s pro-Russian president is in trouble - Taking back the castle

As Democratic checks and balances buckle in Poland and Hungary, the Czech Republic has seemed to many like the next central European country in line to succumb. Andrej Babis, a billionaire businessman, became prime minister after winning October’s general election despite facing fraud charges. He now collaborates closely with his country’s pro-Russian though largely ceremonial president, Milos Zeman. Liberals fret that the pair pose a growing challenge to the rule of law and to the Czech Republic’s pro-Western orientation. But Czech voters and institutions appear to be pushing back
.
Although Mr Zeman came top in the first round of the country’s presidential election, scoring 38.6% of the vote on January 12th-13th, he fell well short of a majority. The runner-up, Professor Jiri Drahos, a soft-spoken political novice who previously led the Czech Academy of Sciences, won a larger-than-expected 26.6%, which puts him in a good position to displace the incumbent in the run-off at the end of the month. Three days later, on January 16th, parliament rejected Mr Babis’s attempt to form a minority government.

As the leader of the largest party, he was invited to try to do so by the president, though he controls just 78 of the 200 parliamentary seats, lacks a coalition partner and is accused of fraud in connection with EU subsidies for a development project. All told, the presidential second round, on January 26th-27th, is shaping up as a referendum on the direction of the country, if not the entire region.

In September MPs voted by 123 to four to strip Mr Babis of his immunity from prosecution on the fraud charges, but because parliament was then dissolved for the October election, they must now do so again. In noticeable contrast to Mr Zeman, Mr Drahos has called on Mr Babis to give up his immunity voluntarily, and prove his innocence. On January 16th Mr Babis obliged. With police and prosecutors pressing the case, the Hospodarske Noviny newspaper recently leaked a report from EU investigators accusing Mr Babis of “numerous breaches of national and EU legislation”.

Read more: The Czech Republic’s pro-Russian president is in trouble - Taking back the castle