Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babis Loses His Bid for Re-Election
Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babis lost his re-election bid on Saturday, a major upset against a billionaire businessman who had personified the rise of populist nationalism in Central Europe.
With 99.9 percent of ballots counted, Mr. Babis’s Yes party held 27.2 % of the vote, trailing less than a percentage point behind a coalition of right-leaning parties called Together. Along with a separate, liberal alliance of parties called Pirates and Mayors, the two coalitions appeared to hold 108 of parliament’s 200 seats, according to Czech Television, the national public broadcaster.
On Saturday, leaders of each said they would form a government together.
“Both democratic coalitions have a chance to build a government,” Together leader Petr Fiala told supporters Saturday night. “Change is here. We promised it. We will do it.“
Mr. Babis congratulated Mr. Fiala in brief remarks Saturday, and said he would meet with Czech President
Milos Zeman
on Sunday, to discuss the next government.
Supporters of the Together coalition of right-leaning parties celebrated after the first exit polls in parliamentary elections Saturday.
Photo:
michal cizek/Agence France-Presse/Getty Images
Mr. Babis was once at the forefront of a populist wave that swept Central Europe after the 2015 migrant crisis. As center-left parties in the region collapsed, the blunt-spoken agricultural tycoon—the Czech Republic’s second-richest citizen—stepped in, allying himself with Hungary’s nationalist Prime Minister
Viktor Orban
and lambasting the European Union as an elitist establishment, distant from the concerns of ordinary Czechs.
On the campaign trail, he mused about abolishing the European Parliament, which he called “a completely useless institution.” In a book, he proposed disbanding the Czech Senate, a legislative body he blamed for gridlock stifling a country he promised to run with businesslike acumen. He spoke fondly of President
visiting the fellow billionaire in 2019, and giving him a 24-karat gold-plated pistol.
But Mr. Babis struggled to beat back the center-right coalition, whose anticorruption message got a final lap boost, last weekend, when Mr. Babis was named in the so-called Pandora papers: a report of political figures using offshore tax havens that was published by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists. The report claimed Mr. Babis spent $22 million through shell companies to buy a château in France. Mr. Babis said the purchase was both taxed and conducted according to the law.
His defeat is likely to resonate in Hungary, where another coalition of center-right parties…
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