IHS Global Insight Perspective | |
Significance | The Czech Republic held the second round of the senatorial election last Friday and Saturday (22 and 23 October), where one-third of the 81 Senate seats were up for grabs. |
Implications | The opposition centre-left Social Democrats won the poll and will now control a majority of 41 seats, giving the party a significant say on laws and reforms discussed in the Senate. |
Outlook | The senators can only delay—and not block—the majority of the laws passed by the parliament's lower house; the government-proposed austerity measures will therefore not be jeopardised. However, the senators will have a major say on various constitutional amendments and foreign policy, which require consent of both houses of parliament. |
Shift to Left
The Czech Republic held the second round of its senatorial election last Friday and Saturday (22 and 23 October), with 27 seats of the 81-member house up for grabs. The centre-left Social Democratic Party (CSSD) managed to win the election, and will now control a majority of 41 seats in the parliament's upper house. The centre-right Civic Democrats (ODS), currently the biggest government party, defended only 8 of its Senate seats, and will now control 25 mandates. The junior government coalition party TOP09 will control five seats, while the second junior government partner, Public Affairs (VV), failed to win a single seat. The opposition Communists (KSCM) will control two seats, and independents three seats. The Christian Democratic Union-People's Party, which is currently not represented in the Chamber of Deputies (lower house of parliament), will control five seats in the Senate.
Voter turnout in the second round of the senatorial poll was 24.6%, a considerable drop from the 44.59% of voters who cast their votes in the first round (see Czech Republic: 18 October 2010: Election 2010: Austerity Cuts at Stake As Czech Voters Swing Left in Senate and Municipal Elections).
Last weekend's senatorial poll represented a second major test for the newly elected centre-right government of Prime Minister Petr Necas, which assumed power in the wake of the May election to the Chamber of Deputies. The reformist government, which built its pre-election campaign mainly on fiscal responsibility, has pledged to cut the fiscal deficit from 5.9% of GDP in 2009 to 4.6% of GDP in 2011, and below 3% of GDP by 2013. In order to do this, the government has recently unveiled an austerity package that would see, above all, a 10-percentage-point cut in public-sector wages. The move has outraged the country's main trade union, and the protest it staged in September saw thousands of demonstrators calling for Necas's administration to re-evaluate its plans (see Czech Republic: 22 September 2010: Thousands Rally Against Czech Government's Spending Cut Plans). The government has further promised to reform the country's outdated pension and healthcare systems, as well as make the labour environment more investment friendly. However, although many Czech voters realised sweeping reforms were needed, and the centre-right parties thus won a comfortable majority in the May election, the tables have since turned and voters seem to be shifting to the left amid Necas's belt-tightening measures. According to a public survey conducted by STEM agency earlier this month, the current government composition of the ODS-TOP09-VV would garner only 95 seats (currently 118 seats), while the current opposition of the CSSD and KSCM would win a majority of 105 seats in the 200-member lower house, if the parliamentary election were held then.
Outlook and Implications
The CSSD victory will complicate the government's ride in parliament, but it is unlikely to jeopardise the austerity measures and reforms that the centre-right administration is proposing. The Chamber of Deputies dominates the parliamentary legislative process, but the senators can delay proposed legislature by up to 30 days before they return it back to the Chamber for re-evaluation. However, with a comfortable majority in the Chamber, the centre-left government will be able to outvote the Senate's decision and ultimately pass the reforms and bills into law. The CSSD has promised not to reject all the government's measures automatically, but it plans to turn down any proposals it perceives as "too harsh for low-income groups". Finance Minister Miroslav Kalousek has noted that the cabinet will now have to submit bills to the lower house "five weeks earlier" to offset the delay the senators could potentially cause. With Necas's government determined to continue in its reformist trend, the future of the reforms and cost-cutting measures is not bleak, but any delays could be detrimental and affect the improvement of the country's economic situation.
Nonetheless, there are some instances where the Chamber does not have the power to outvote the Senate, when it comes to passing various constitutional amendments, electing the country's president, and deciding on some aspects of foreign policy, including the deployment of Czech troops abroad. The latter in particular might prove to be a significant obstacle for the government, which plans to strengthen the contingent in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO)-led anti-Taliban mission by an additional 200 soldiers next year, a move the CSSD strongly opposes (see Afghanistan - Czech Republic: 24 September 2010: Czech Government Pledges More Troops for NATO Anti-Taliban Mission). Without the Senate's approval, this decision is unlikely to materialise.
The election results are also likely to influence the inter-party situation in the CSSD and VV. Following unsuccessful results in the May general election, the CSSD leader Jiri Paroubek resigned, and was later replaced by Bohumil Sobotka, who is to head the party until a new leader is elected next year. The senatorial victory has now improved considerably Sobotka's chances of remaining at the party helm after the vote. The results could also shake the current coalition government, given that its junior partner VV's performance produced weak results in both last week's municipal and senatorial elections, and its members have called for re-evaluation of the party's policies. The VV is a parliamentary novice, and as such, its actions are seen as least predictive. As Czech news agency CTK reports, prior to the election, some VV members called for the party to "outweigh socially the government-sponsored right-wing reforms". Such a populist direction could attract more support in the future, but will be against the government's current austerity trend. In order to save the coalition, the ODS and TOP09 might, however, accept some of the VV's proposals and potentially weaken its pro-reformist tone. Nonetheless, at this point, such a scenario is not an imminent risk for the Necas coalition, and the Czech Republic is set to continue in its current direction towards savings and reforms, at least in the short-to-mid term.