Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala (ODS) will propose to President Petr Pavel that he dismiss Ivan Bartos (Pirates) from his post as Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Regional Development on 30 September, he announced today.
He said Bartos is not capable of bringing the digitalisation of construction procedure to a successful conclusion. From Wednesday, a team headed by Transport Minister Martin Kupka (ODS) will be in charge of the digitisation.
The Prime Minister said he is satisfied with the work of the two other Pirate ministers and does not consider his decision to be a termination of the coalition agreement.
Jan Lipavsky (Pirates) is Foreign Affairs Minister and Michal Salomoun (for Pirates) is Minister for Legislation.
Fiala has asked the Pirate Party to present a new candidate for regional development minister who can handle the job managerially.
He said he informed President Pavel and the leaders of the three other coalition partners in advance of his decision, which he finally reached after his meeting with Bartos this morning.
Fiala said he respects Bartos personally and on a human level, and has always been able to rely on him.
“I am not making this decision light-heartedly, but digitalisation is a key project for the modernisation of the Czech state and we cannot afford any further delays,” he said, adding that as the person responsible for the implementation of the government policy statement and the functioning of the government, he now sees no other solution than replacing the minister.
Fiala said he became sure that Bartos was not capable of completing the digitalisation after the last cabinet meeting, where digitalisation was discussed, and after today’s meeting with Bartos.
“I think that he does not even acknowledge the real state of the digitisation of the construction procedure,” Fiala said. He said he had repeatedly given Bartos time to resolve the situation, but a successful conclusion was nowhere in sight.
This morning, Bartos and Fiala held a meeting to discuss the political situation and ways forward. After the meeting, Bartos told reporters that nothing had changed in the coalition agreement or the government’s engagement, and the five-party coalition would continue to work.
Asked about the troubled digitalisation project, Bartos said the five coalition parties should pull together. He said the approval of the bill on housing support by the end of the year and the guarantee of investment in housing construction were now the priorities of the Pirates.
Bartos acknowledged that this weekend’s regional elections saw bad results for the Pirates, but noted that the results were not positive for the other coalition parties either. “It was a slap in the face for the Pirates, who did not defend their positions, but it was also not a good result for the coalition as a whole,” he said.
Before the meeting with Fiala this morning he told reporters that the Pirates were not going to leave the government. “We made a promise to the people as part of the coalition agreement,” he said, noting that 82.1% of Pirate members had backed the government coalition agreement at the end of 2021.
