Babis’s return steers Czechia from Ukraine, toward Russian

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Prague – four years ago it seemed that the days in the policy of the billionaire Andrei Babish were numbered.

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Ano Babish created the ANO movement (the abbreviation of the actions of unsatisfied citizens, which means “yes” in the Czech Republic) to withstand the main political parties, was defeated in October 2021 by the coalition of professional groups. It was assumed that the leader of the populist would fulfill his promise to leave, and not be in the opposition.

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Instead, he immediately began an aggressive campaign accusing the ruling coalition for each problem, from the energy crisis to soaring inflation. He promised that he promised to cancel the promising growth of state retirement age and put an end to assistance to Ukraine, while ridicurating Prime Minister Peter Fial for the fact that he is the best prime minister of Ukraine than in the Czech Republic.

On Saturday, ANO won his big victory in the elections since his founding in 2011.

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“This is the culmination of my political career for me,” said 71 -year -old Babish, who was a member of the Communist Party before the 1989 velvet revolution in the former Czechoslovakia and compared with US President Donald Trump.

Consequences for Ukraine

Babish’s victory deprives Ukraine of a persistent supporter and directs the Czech Republic to the pro -Russian path along which Hungary and Slovakia.

It is expected that he will join the ranks of Viktor Orban from Hungary and Robert Fiko from Slovakia, whose countries refused to provide military assistance to Ukraine, continue to import Russian oil and confront sanctions in Russia.

Babish said that he plans to abandon the international recognized Czech initiative, which acquires artillery shells for Ukraine in the markets outside the EU. He also opposes the obligation of NATO to significantly increase defense costs and criticized the transaction on the purchase of 24 fighters in the USA F-35.

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In Europe, Babish has already combined his efforts with his friend Orban to create a new alliance in the European parliament, “patriots for Europe” to represent tough groups that criticize the EU migration and climatic policy, and preferring national sovereignty.

Tomash Weiss, assistant professor of the Department of International Relations at Charles University in Prague, said that he expects Babish to apply a pragmatic approach to the EU from his business interests. Babish can be a vocal critic of the EU at home, but would not have represented big obstacles in Brussels, he said.

“Fiko and Orban can celebrate, but they are not players who matter at the European level,” Weiss said.

Problems in the past

Babish had his first impact on the Czech political scene in the 2013 elections, taking second place and becoming the Minister of Finance.

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Among his movements, he proposed reducing the taxes for beer more than half-politician, who resonated the Chekhov’s favorite beer.

Being the owner of the agricultural conglomerate of about 200 agricultural, food, chemical and media companies, Babish faced the accusations that officials of the Ministry of Finance used their powers to force their business -competitors to liquidate. Fearing a combination of wealth and power, the parliament approved the law that forced Babish to transfer the agricultural sector to an independent target fund. Ultimately, he was fired as the Minister of Finance in 2017 from inexplicable business transactions.

Its popularity did not suffer, and he won the 2017 election, becoming the Prime Minister and creating a minority government with social democrats who controlled individual communists.

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During his rapid term of authority, the police recommended that he accuse him of proposed fraud with the participation of EU subsidies. A quarter of a million people took to the streets – the biggest demonstrations since 1989 – twice in 2019 to demand that Babis decrease from his scandals, including a conflict of interests regarding the EU subsidies.

In 2021, he was shot down by another scandal that connected him and hundreds of other rich people with offshore accounts in the results, called Pandora. Soon he lost the parliamentary elections, and two years later he was defeated as a result of a large extent of the president’s ceremonial post Peter Pavel, retired, general general.

Problems ahead

Babis bounced back, but the problems remain.

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He was still charged with fraud on the EU subsidies, and the new parliament will have to raise his official immunity for the court in order to pronounce the sentence.

It must also comply with the requirements of the corrected law on a conflict of interest. The current more strict legislation does not allow the transfer of ownership of target funds or relatives.

Without a majority in the lower house, Babish prefers to manage alone, but his minority cabinet will require the silent support of freedom and direct democracy of the anti-migrant party and right motorists for himself to win the obligatory parliamentary vote of trust in the board.

Another option for these three is to rule along with a convenient majority. Babish shares with motorists the abandonment of the EU climate and migration policy and other issues, but the Freedom Party wants to withdraw the country from the EU and NATO, the Red line for Babish and motorists.

There are also questions about the stability of any support from the Freedom Party, which worked on a joint ticket with three groups of extremists, with the possibility that disagreements on numerous issues may soon appear.

“We are entering into an unknown future,” said the analyst Vladimir Dvokhakov from the Czech Technical University in Prague, Czech Public Television.

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