‘Do you trust the media?’, asks former Prime Minister Andrej Babis. It is not a strange question for the Czech populist who narrowly lost the parliamentary elections last autumn. During his premiership (2017-2021), he regularly criticized the media in his country. But that Babis had this text with his portrait printed on the front page of the national newspapers last week Mlada Fronta Dnes and Lidove Noviny, is remarkable to say the least. Not least because Babis, besides being a politician, also a very wealthy businessman (estimated wealth: 4 billion euros), is the owner of both titles.
The stunt came under fierce criticism. This front page is, according to critics, the last nail in the coffin of the newspapers. A coffin that the former prime minister has been skilfully sealing for years, since his company Agrofert bought the newspapers in 2013. Since then, there has been hardly any independent journalism. The takeover was followed by an exodus of journalists (left or fired), including former editor-in-chief of Mlada Fronta Dnes, Robert Casensky. He called the front page on Twitter “the absolute humiliation” of his old newspaper. Other Czech titles bounced back the same week. The weekly magazine Tydenik Forum imitated the ad on its own front page, asking ‘Do you believe him?’
protest party
Babis, who shook up Czech politics years ago with his protest party ANO, says he doesn’t see the problem. He paid neatly for the front pages, because it’s an advertisement. Newspapers that do not own Babis, however, rejected it. The ad discredits media, the editor-in-chief of the competing tabloid said Blesk as a reason.
The Czech Foundation for Independent Journalism (NFNZ) agrees. Babis advertises his show Hey lidi! (“Hi guys!”), which appears on social media and YouTube. In half-hour videos, he himself discusses current events, because he does not trust the media.
Babis’s crazies don’t come out of the blue. A lawsuit against the former prime minister for fraud started this week. His company Agrofert received 2 million euros in EU funds in a roundabout way in 2007, while it was not entitled to them (a revelation from the independent media that Babis warns his viewers about). For years Babis avoided prosecution because his political office granted him immunity. In 2017 and 2018, parliament withdrew his immunity, but he managed to regain it. Three times is a charm: in March he lost his immunity again and now he is in the dock.
With a camper through the country
The former prime minister has another reason to put himself in the spotlight: the Czechs will elect a new president in January. Babis is not participating for the time being, but according to political analysts it is only a matter of time. Last summer Babis traveled through the country with a camper to talk to Czechs. Also this spring several billboards appeared with the text ‘Under Babis it was better’, on which ‘ordinary Czechs’ tell how the new government is disappointing them. Indeed, many Czechs – two-thirds of the population according to a recent poll – are dissatisfied with the government, partly because of inflation and rising energy prices.
The political landscape in the Czech Republic is fragmented, as a result of which a relatively large number of parties did not reach the 5 percent electoral threshold in recent elections. A quarter of the total number of votes ended up in the trash, in other words: one in four Czechs does not see their vote in the current parliament. They will be allowed to go to the polls again in January. Time will tell whether Babis is running for the presidency, which is mainly symbolic, by the way.
But there is one added benefit: as president, he would regain his immunity from prosecution.
Arnout le Clercq is a correspondent in Prague.