What business wants

It's fair to say that Vladimír Špidla has lost nearly the entire support of the business community. He has admitted in recent interviews that he mainly won the parliamentary elections because he promised to do away with the Zeman-Klaus Václav opposition agreement, yet he has incorrectly understood his mandate as being something more. Instead of erasing corruption, completing privatization and liberalization, and instituting reform, he has waded deeper into socialism, without exorcising the demon of Miloš Zeman. Špidla now has a second chance. If he agrees to Finance Minister Bohuslav Sobotka's public-finance reform, prevents Zeman from returning as either president or ČSSD chairman, and eliminates the corruption in public contracts, he can regain his lost support. Špidla might not be a likable leader, but that won't matter as long as he starts getting results.