Thirty political groupings have submitted candidate lists to the Interior Ministry for the June elections to the European Parliament, the ministry announced on Twitter (styled as ‘X’). There are ten fewer groupings running than in the European elections five years ago, while the number of coalitions has increased by almost half.
The ministry will decide by 20 April which lists have met all legal requirements and will be allowed to run.
The deadline for submitting candidate lists expired at 4pm yesterday.
In the last European Parliament elections in 2019, 40 lists were registered, including six coalitions, and 39 of them were admitted to the elections, as one of the parties failed to pay the CZK 15,000 contribution to the election costs.
All nine parliamentary parties and movements have announced their candidacies for the upcoming European elections, which will take place in the Czech Republic on 7-8 June. Of these, only the senior opposition ANO and the junior coalition Pirates are running separately.
Of the other parties in parliament, the ruling Civic Democrats (ODS), Christian Democrats (KDU-CSL) and TOP 09 will run as Spolu, in the same coalition as in the last parliamentary elections in 2021, while Mayors and Independents (STAN) and the Mayors for the Liberec Region (SLK) have formed a separate coalition, Mayors and Personalities for Europe.
The far-right Freedom and Direct Democracy (SPD) has formed a joint list of election candidates with the non-parliamentary Tricolour movement. The Communists (KSCM) hope to keep their representatives in the European Parliament, running in the Stacilo! coalition with the United Democrats, an association of independents.
The SEN 21 movement has formed an election coalition with the EU federalist party Volt Cesko. The PRO Jindrich Rajchl coalition is made up of the groups Law Respect Expertise (PRO) and Right Choice for Health and Sport.
The largest coalition, with five members, is the Alliance of National Forces, led by current SPD MEP Hynek Blasko, which also includes the Workers’ Party of Social Justice, National Democracy and Rozumni.
The centre-left Social Democracy (formerly known as CSSD, now SOCDEM) is seeking to return to the European Parliament, with former foreign minister Lubomir Zaoralek as its lead candidate.
Ex-Prime Minister Jiri Paroubek is the lead candidate for the Czech Sovereignty coalition.
Other parties registered for the elections including the Greens, the Democratic Greens, and Hlas, led by former MEP and EU commissioner Pavel Telicka. Newcomers include the Liberal Alliance of Independent Citizens and Mourek, the “party for people and cats with an open mind”. Traditional participants in the election contest include the Left Party, the Club of Committed Non-Party Members, the Vote Right Bloc and the Moravian Land Movement. The anarcho-capitalist Urza.cz party has also registered, but campaigns for citizens not to vote.
