Final Word from Monday, June 12, 2006
The blitzkrieg against small parties has been conducted from several angles. A head-on attack came from Finance Minister Bohuslav Sobotka prior to the elections, when he refused to pay matching funds to SNK-ED on a technicality. Then mere hours after the elections ODS put the moral blame for its almost-loss on small parties that "wasted" 5% of the vote. If these parties had acted responsibly and joined with ODS, it said, the center-right would have easily won. And then yesterday, Premier Jiří Paroubek acknowledged that a constitutional amendment for changing the electoral system might be needed. What the two main parties fail to mention, of course, is that the small parties play an important control mechanism. Changing the electoral system might eliminate the small parties, but only a change in the behavior of ODS and ČSSD will eliminate the need for them. [Czech Republic European Democrats elections]