Petr Pavel has just lost the presidential election

By refusing to appoint Filip Turek, the honorary leader of the Motorists for Themselves party, as Minister of the Environment, President Petr Pavel has most likely lost the presidential election in 2028.

How is that possible? The results of last year’s parliamentary elections and those in 2021 show that voter support is divided between the current governing coalition and the opposition roughly in a 60:40 ratio. The fact that today’s opposition governed in the previous electoral term was due to a large number of votes being wasted on unsuccessful potential coalition partners of the ANO movement. As a result, the group around Petr Fiala benefited from this by coincidence. In the 2023 presidential election, Petr Pavel received the support of 58% of voters (approximately 3.3 million votes). From these figures, it is clear that some of those who voted for him must also have been voters who last year supported parties now forming the governing coalition. It is precisely these votes that Petr Pavel has lost through his recent actions.

Further steps by the president

And it is not just about the refusal to appoint Filip Turek. Let us recall, for example, the maneuvering and the invention of conditions not anchored in law that Petr Pavel imposed on Andrej Babiš before he was even willing to appoint him prime minister. Or the attempt to interfere with the emerging government’s policy statement. Through his actions, Petr Pavel is simply convincing people that he is not a president for everyone, but only for the opposition. In that case, however, he can hardly expect to receive significant electoral support from voters of the governing coalition.

Some may object that the presidential election is still two years away and that by then everyone will have forgotten the refusal to appoint Filip Turek, just like the president’s other post-election “missteps.” New topics will emerge. That is certainly true, but in my view Petr Pavel’s opponents will not miss a single opportunity to bring these matters up before the presidential election and remind voters of them. The “violation of the Constitution” card is simply strong enough that it cannot be ignored. Especially when it can be accompanied by an ace in the form of a comparison with Miloš Zeman, who was criticized for the very same step—only for Petr Pavel to end up doing exactly the same thing.

Untarnished?

Admittedly, this card will not work on voters of the current opposition, because they do not concern themselves with any violation of the Constitution. In their eyes, Petr Pavel is a paragon of all morality, next to whom even Mirek Dušín would look like an ordinary scoundrel. And so they will simply forgive him everything. Or rather, they live under the conviction that he has not committed anything unconstitutional at all. But these voters will not decide the presidential election. The deciding factor will be the undecided voters—those who vote one way in parliamentary elections and another in presidential elections. And among them, Petr Pavel’s image is tarnished to such an extent that not even his marketing team could clean it up with bleach. The pre-election campaign will therefore primarily be about drawing attention to this stain.

Although it may seem that by refusing to appoint Filip Turek Petr Pavel is celebrating a victory, the opposite is true. He is a soldier, so in terms he understands it can be said that by winning a single battle, he has lost the entire war. He has handed the governing coalition a powerful weapon—namely the accusation that Petr Pavel violated the Constitution. In this situation, it is only logical that neither Andrej Babiš nor the Motorists will pursue the dispute through a competence lawsuit in court. Regardless of the outcome, it would only strengthen Petr Pavel. If the court ruled in their favor and Filip Turek became a minister, the president would appear as a “hero” who resisted until the last moment and yielded only on the basis of a court decision. And if they failed with their lawsuit, it would then be difficult for them to attack him in the presidential election over a violation of the Constitution.

Someone may argue that all of this sounds fine, but that there is no one in sight who could replace Petr Pavel at Prague Castle, and that victory will therefore fall into his lap. I think that is an unnecessary concern. Let us recall the last presidential election. Two years beforehand, no one imagined that Petr Pavel himself could become president. So a suitable opposing candidate will certainly emerge.

And given Petr Pavel’s recent actions, that candidate will be well armed.

Source: Deník.to