Billionaire’s Government Faces Biggest Test Yet in Czech Party Referendum
- Social Democrat head says cabinet role could halt poll decline
- Minority government would need backing of Communist Party
Andrej Babis.
Photographer: Martin Divisek/BloombergThis article is for subscribers only.
Czech caretaker Prime Minister Andrej Babis’s plan to form a regular government seven months after elections is being put to its biggest challenge yet as his potential coalition partner started a party-wide referendum on the tie-up.
The Social Democrats’ almost 18,000 members can vote between Monday and June 14 on whether to create a minority cabinet with billionaire Babis’s ANO party, which won October general elections but fell short of a majority. If the referendum succeeds, the two former coalition partners, which are largely vying for the same voters, expect to initially rely on support from the Communists. ANO’s first bid for a single-party minority government was defeated in a January confidence vote.