The by-elections in the Brno-City Senate constituency to elect the successor to senator Roman Kraus (ODS), who died suddenly on Wednesday at the age of 69, will take place on 17-18 January next year, President Petr Pavel announced yesterday.
The decision is subject to the co-signature of PM Petr Fiala (ODS).
The reason for the death of the senator and former director of both Brno university hospitals was a pulmonary embolism, said Jiří Crha, deputy chairman of the South Moravian ODS branch.
Kraus, chairman of the Senate health committee, was an ODS member in Brno since 2004.
Senators and deputies honoured his memory with a minute of silence during their meetings last Thursday.
By law, Pavel had to announce the date of the election to be held within 90 days.
The newly elected senator will take office for the rest of Kraus’s term, which was due to end in October 2026.
By-elections to the upper house of parliament are held when an incumbent senator’s term ends early, whether due to death, resignation or election to an office incompatible with a Senate seat. However, the election law provides that by-elections shall not be called if there is one year or less to run before the end of the mandate.
Kraus was born on 27 October 1955 in Brno. He graduated from a secondary school in Brno and then from the Faculty of Medicine in Brno. He gained his first anaesthesiology experience at Vyskov hospital, South Moravia, then worked at the St. Anne’s Hospital. From 1989 to 1991, he worked in Yemen as a medical expert. In 1994, he became the medical deputy director of St. Anne’s for surgical specialties, and headed the hospital from 2006 to 2007. From 2007-2019, he was the director of the Brno Teaching Hospital.
He was elected senator in 2020.
