President Petr Pavel yesterday refused to appoint Motorists MP Filip Turek as environment minister, Prime Minister Andrej Babis (ANO) said after his New Year’s lunch with Pavel at Prague Castle. The Prime Minister added that he is not considering a competence lawsuit against Pavel.
At the lunch, Babis again submitted the nomination of Turek to the President, based on a previous agreement with the Motorists, one of ANO’s two junior coalition partners.
“Although I spent an hour trying to convince the President to be above the fray, do a good deed and give Filip Turek a chance, the President refused and does not want to nominate Turek. He said he would comment in writing,” said Babis.
Babis repeatedly said he was not considering a competence lawsuit over the President’s refusal to appoint Turek.
The Presidential Office said later that Pavel’s position on appointing Turek to the cabinet has remained unchanged. It said the President would send the Prime Minister an answer in writing.
Such a step would establish whether the president has the right to refuse to appoint a nominated minister, as previous Czech presidents have done in exceptional cases.
The Presidential Office said in December, after a meeting between Pavel and Turek, that the head of state expected Babis not to nominate Turek as minister again. If Babis did not meet that expectation, the Presidential Office indicated that Pavel would not appoint Turek, although he considers it an extraordinary step.
Turek has faced criticism for racist and homophobic posts on social media. He has apologised for the remarks, but denied authorship of some of them. Turek has also been the subject of controversy over his property declarations, and reports that he threatened an employee of the Saudi Arabian embassy eight years ago.
The Motorists parliamentary group later unanimously expressed their support for Turek’s nomination, and concern over President Pavel’s approach to fulfilling his constitutional duties, group chairman Boris Stastny told reporters after their two-hour meeting yesterday evening, reading a written statement without taking questions.
Turek remains the Motorists’ only nominee for minister, Stastny said. The MPs’ group agreed on further steps, which it will first discuss with coalition partners ANO and SPD at Monday’s meeting of the Coalition Council, he added.
“The Motorists’ MPs also appreciated the loyal approach of Babis, which we consider to be a confirmation of the stability of the government coalition,” said Stastny.
Motorists leader and Foreign Minister Petr Macinka, who is temporarily heading the Ministry of the Environment, ruled out yesterday that the party might leave the government because of Pavel’s refusal to appoint Turek, and again ruled out a competence lawsuit against the president. He said that Pavel would welcome this step as he could be granted additional powers by the Constitutional Court.
“If the president intends to break up the coalition with this move so that the Motorists leave and are replaced by one of the parties closer to his ideology, then he is deeply mistaken,” Macinka told reporters before the Motorists’ meeting yesterday.
