SMALL CZECH PARTIES AND THE 2006 ELECTION: 1 + 1

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 03 PRAGUE 001209

SIPDIS

SENSITIVE

E.O. 12958: N/A
TAGS: PGOV EZ
SUBJECT: SMALL CZECH PARTIES AND THE 2006 ELECTION: 1 + 1
+ 1 + 1 = 0?


1. (SBU) SUMMARY. The current consensus in political circles
in Prague says that there will be only four parties in
government after next June's elections and that likely
scenarios include a grand coalition between the Social
Democrats (CSSD) and the Civic Democrats (ODS),a minority
government, or an arrangement under which the Communists
(KSCM) support the Social Democrats. However, there are a
handful of small, primarily liberal parties that could make a
different scenario possible if they were to join forces and
together collect enough votes to make it over the 5%
threshold needed for entry into parliament. Post sat down
with former Prague Mayor Jan Kasl, who is trying to use his
party, the European Democrats (ED),as the umbrella
organization for such an attempt. Kasl faces a number of
problems including personal animosities, conflicting
ambitions, and lack of money. There is also the threat that
another small party could emerge as an alternative for
disaffected voters. A fallback position for Kasl would be to
unite only for the purposes of the local elections in Prague
next November. END SUMMARY


2. (U) In the 2002 elections, roughly 1 vote in 8 was cast
for parties that did not make it into parliament. Kasl
estimates that the level of dissatisfied or disaffected
voters looking for an alternative could be as high as 30
percent. Kasl believes that if personal differences can be
set aside, and adequate financing obtained, his group will
have no trouble getting more than 5 percent. Those are two
big ifs. Kasl's detractors say he lacks the drive and
pushiness to overcome these problems.

IT'S MY PARTY AND I'LL TRY IF I WANT TO

3.(U) Kasl established the ED in the summer of 2002 to
compete in the local elections in Prague. The party took 15
seats and came in 2nd to ODS, which refused to form a
coalition. ED is in the opposition in Prague. In the Spring
of 2003 ED expanded to regions outside Prague in order to run
for the EP elections in 2004. ED negotiated with SNK, the
Union of Independents, which was started in 2000 to allow
unaffiliated mayors to compete in regional elections. SNK won
2.8 percent of the votes in the 2002 elections for the lower
house and two seats in the 2002 Senate elections The joint
slate of ED-SNK won 11 percent of the vote and three seats in
the 2004 elections for the European Parliament. SNK's
political leader, Josef Zielenec, who led the joint ticket,
is now a member of the European Parliament.


4. (SBU) Kasl finds Zielenec a divisive figure. Kasl said,
for example, that Senator Karel Schwarzenberg and economist
Jan Svejnar both refused to join the ED-SNK ticket for the
elections to the European Parliament because of Zielenec, who
some accuse of being ambitious and egotistical. Schwarzenberg
is the sole elected official for the ODA or Civic Democratic
Alliance. ODA broke away from the Civic Democrats in 1991,
to a large extent because of personal antipathy to then ODS
chairman and current President Vaclav Klaus. This still
makes cooperation with ODS difficult, if not impossible. ODA
currently has heavy debts and support among voters that
doesn't reach even one percent.


5. (SBU) Kasl finds a number of ideological similarities
between his party and the Greens, and ex-president Havel is
pushing to have the Greens as part of Kasl's plans. However,
Martin Bursik, who is likely to be the next chair of the
Greens, wants his party to run separately. The Greens
received 1.1 percent in the 1998 elections, 2.4 percent in
the 2002 elections, and 3.16 in the 2004 elections for the
European Parliament. Former war correspondent and human
rights activist Jaromir Stetina, though an independent, won a
seat to the Senate in 2004 on the Greens ticket and could be
expected to lend his support to Kasl's plan.


6. (SBU) Kasl said he has asked the Czech Republic's former
EU commissioner, Pavel Telicka, to join the group. According
to Kasl, Telicka indicated he would join if Kasl could
guarantee that Telicka would receive a seat in parliament.

7.(SBU) Kasl thinks Freedom Union party vice-chair, Frantisek
Pelc, could join the group and run successfully in his
hometown of Liberec. Freedom Union is the largest of the
small parties with 10 members in parliament's lower house.
But party chief, Justice Minister Pavel Nemec, has so far
refused to bring the entire party into Kasl's group.

MONEY DOESN'T TALK HERE, IT RANTS

8.(U) Relatively small amounts of money can have significant
influence on the conduct and outcome of elections in the
Czech Republic. Parties receive funds from the state based
on the number of seats they have in the Senate, The Chamber
of Deputies, and local governments. If one party decides to
join another party, the first party must cease to exist,
thereby foregoing any income from seats it has. The money
can't be transferred. A seat in the Senate brings the party
900,000 Crowns, or roughly USD 40,000 a year. Kasl would
like to see three parties now represented in the Senate -
Freedom Union, SNK, and ODA join him for next year's
elections, but that would mean these parties would have to
give up their state stipends. Freedom Union, which is
expected to disappear from the Chamber of Deputies next year,
receives USD80,000 a year for Senators Fejfar and Hadrova,
both of whom are up for election next year. SNK also
receives USD40,000 a year for two senators; Petrov whose term
runs until 2010, and Novotny, whose term ends in 2008. In
financial terms, asking SNK to join Kasl's party in 2006 is
tantamount to asking SNK to forego six installments of
USD40,000, or nearly a quarter of a million dollars. The
third party, ODA, has only one senator, Karel Schwarzenberg,
but his term also runs until 2010. If elected officials
could bring their party stipends with them when they join new
parties, it would be much easier for the small parties to
form larger, significant blocs. But the law would need to be
changed by parliament and the bigger parties there have no
incentive to make it easier for smaller blocs to coalesce
into stronger, more competitive parties.


9. (SBU) Kasl claims the state owes his party more than 10
million crowns for the 15 seats it won in the 2002 local
elections. He says the figure will have risen to 15 million
by the time of next year's elections and will seriously
threaten his party's ability to compete in the elections if
the money is not paid. Kasl explained that three laws could
possibly apply and the state has chosen the one that provides
the smallest stipend. Kasl says he has raised the issue with
Finance Minister Sobotka and added that Sobotka doesn't see
ED as a threat. Courts will settle the issue over the coming
months, possibly too late for Kasl's election campaign. In
the meantime Kasl is using student volunteers.


10. (U) Parties that receive more than 3 percent of the
popular vote also are reimbursed by the state. In the last
general election, the rate was 90 Crowns, or about four
dollars per vote.


11. (SBU) If Kasl's group succeeds in getting into
parliament, Kasl says they will push for European
integration, more transparency in government, particularly on
public procurement, and structural reforms needed in areas
such as pensions and health care. Kasl said he wouldn't be
content as a member of the parliamentary opposition because
he feels there is so much that needs to be changed. He said
he would prefer to join and ODS government, though the party
would have to modify it's current opposition to European
integration before the European Democrats could join them.
Kasl said a coalition with CSSD would also be possible.

12.(SBU) One wild card in the deck is Vladimir Zelezny,
former director of TV NOVA, the first privately owned
nationwide TV station to be set up after the fall of
communism. Zelezny, although considered a crook by many and
still facing charges of harming a creditor and tax evasion,
was the only Senator to be elected in the first round of
voting in 2002. He also was successful in his run for the
European Parliament in 2004. On August 6th, Zelezny was
chosen as chairman of a new party, the Independent Democrats.
Kasl represents a worldly, tolerant, intelligentsia. Zelezny,
on the other hand, aims to mine the wider vein of xenophobia
and intolerance. And along with that populist appeal, he has
money and that could win him enough votes to enter
parliament. On the day he was chosen to lead the new party,
Zelezny, who will run in the wine region of Southern Moravia,
gave an interview to Blesk, the nation's tawdriest tabloid
and best-selling paper, saying, "Why should Moravian wine be
made from Moldavian grapes? Why should an American junkie or
someone interested in child pornography visit our country
without visas just because he is an American while a
blameless Czech must undergo the US visa bullying." Kasl said
he wouldn't work with Zelezny. Ever. Kasl also said he feared
that Zelezny would succeed and predicted his votes would be
taken from ODS. Whereas Kasl claims his three year old party
has approximately 500 members, Zelezny claims to have signed
up 700 followers in a few weeks.


13. (SBU) If Kasl and those who agree with his plan can't
make a credible run for representation in Parliament in next
June's elections, they will continue trying to join forces
for the Prague local elections, scheduled for next November.
Senator Edward Outrata, an unaffiliated representative of one
of Prague's constituencies, supports this plan. As he put it,
" The idea os to join the forces of the pro-European center
right, who are basically liberals. They agree with the Civic
Democrats on many economic issues, but on the other hand
can't accept the nationalist orientation, which borders on
xenophobia."


14. COMMENT: (SBU)It's still too early to say whether any of
the so-called minnows will make it into the next Czech
parliament. Administrative hurdles, personal differences, and
lack of funds mean the small party will have a difficult
time. A seat at the table for a group of liberals united
under Kasl's banner would likely tend to further more honest,
accountable government, and support positive ties with the
U.S. Entry of the Greens into Parliament or a coalition
government would also foster cleaner government and a
continuation of the current Czech focus on human rights. A
role for Zelezny's party, on the other hand, would lead to
appeals to Czech nationalism and demagogery. There are many
voters looking for an alternative to the politics of the last
eight years, though likely not enough to support the entry of
all three of these parties into parliament. Kasl probably
has the best chance of the three, particularly if he can
persuade the Greens or Freedom Union to join him. If he
can't find some money and bring at least some of the others
into his tent, Zelezny stands the best chance of becoming the
small player with the disproportionate influence in national
politics.
MUNTER