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It was supposed to
be just another televised
awards show, with lots of gags, presentations, winner of
this, winner of that. But the real action took place in
the bathroom, where Jiří Balvín, the recently ousted director
of Czech Television, got into a brawl with one of his former
editors. It wasn't clear who started it or whether either
man was able to take care of any other business while in
the bathroom. The fight eventually spilled over into a
meeting of the Czech Broadcasting Council, which failed
to agree on a new director for the trouble-plagued station.
Two of the Council's more high profile members quit in
disgust, but there was no immediate cause for alarm. Rehearsals
were already underway for next month's awards show. Meanwhile
across town, Parliament was gearing up for another attempt
at electing a president. Cynicism was running high after
the first two attempts ended in stalemate, but that didn't
stop the Communists from offering a has-been cosmonaut
as their candidate. Even director Miloą Forman tried his
hand by suggesting that the utterly stiff Karel Schwarzenberg,
the former Prince von Schwarzenberg and one of Havel's
closest friends, would make a good president. The ruling
coalition, however, was determined to do it right this
time around and unite around a single candidate. Their
safest bet was to scour the nation's universities for a
person who embodied the best in the philosopher-king tradition
set by Havel. They came up with Jan Sokol, a former dissident
(naturally) who had given up politics to teach philosophy.
But Sokol had an image problem. He liked to wear goofy
hats and bore an eerie resemblance to Dr. Frankenstein.
What's more, 13 years of one philosopher-king was quite
enough, thank you. That was beside the point as far as
the government was concerned. The coalition parties were
boxed in by the power struggle going on at the top of the
Social Democrats. Premier ©pidla had sabotaged a bid by
his former mentor, Miloą Zeman, to become president during
the second round of voting and now the humiliated Zeman
was urging his followers to pay back ©pidla in kind. The
premier's answer was to be pragmatic about the situation
that faces his government: Look, people, let's install
this tobacco-stained intellectual in the Castle. He can
muse about morals and democracy and conjure up images of
Havel for the rest of the world. We will do the real business
of running the country. If not, then Václav Klaus will
win the presidency and there goes our government, perhaps
even before the next election. Pragmatic indeed, but his
plea fell on deaf ears. When it came time to vote, the
Zemanites preferred to settle the score and deserted Sokol.
Since neither Sokol nor Klaus had a majority behind him,
the trump card lay with the same party that Havel ran out
of office in 1989. The Communists, who had jettisoned their
cosmonaut before the voting began, were now poised to select
Havel's successor. On the face of it they would be more
inclined to support the candidate for the leftist government
rather than the conservative opposition. They invited Sokol
to make his case before them, on the anniversary marking
their rise to power no less. It must have been galling
for Sokol, a signer of the famed 1977 Charter challenging
the Communist state, to now have to go begging for their
votes. His lack of political acumen is evident by the fact
that he got absolutely nowhere with them. Klaus, who lives
and breathes politics, had already done his knocking during
the first round of voting. The man who led the country's
messy transition to a free market in the 1990s has always
been anathema to the Communist faithful. But he shares
their disdain for Havel, and his skepticism towards the
European Union and military action against Iraq has gone
down well with their view of the world, which hasn't changed
all that much since their heyday in power. And they didn't
have to be reminded of the service Klaus did them during
last summer's parliamentary elections, when he turned off
many voters with a campaign centered around his own personality.
As a result, the Communists were able to make the gains
that have now cast them in the role of kingmaker. In a
sense, they owed him, and so they put him over the top
with two votes to spare. The question now is whether Klaus
will do anything to bring them back into the mainstream
of political life. In the days leading up to the election,
he indicated he would reverse Havel's refusal to enter
into negotiations with the Communists regarding matters
of state. For its part, Klaus' party has already shown
that it can work hand in hand with them. Just days before
the presidential vote, the Civic Democrats and Communists
teamed up to block the passage of a bill that would have
provided a government pension to Havel (who, granted, hardly
needs one). Maybe once Klaus is ready to retire from office,
they will band together again and this time approve it.
The country can only hope that they get into their own
bathroom brawl before then.
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