Bátora to enter electoral politics

The sudden resignation of controversial Education Ministry official Ladislav Bátora could set into motion the first real attempt to establish a large, relevant far-right party as the divisive staffer with a broad nationalist agenda says he is leaving to pursue his own political career.

Bátora announced Oct. 14 that he plans to leave his post at the ministry, saying he wants to focus on entering politics and fears he will not be able to fulfill a promise to keep his polarizing ultra-conservative views to himself.

Bátora, whose extreme-right beliefs made him an unpopular hire for Minister Josef Dobeš (Public Affairs, VV), spent much of the summer months embroiled in controversy after comments he made against the Prague Pride gay festival. He was labeled an anti-gay fascist by Finance Minister Miroslav Kalousek and Foreign Affairs Minister Karel Schwarzenberg (TOP 09) then drew sharp criticism from the media and government officials for firing back with a comment on his Facebook page referring to Schwarzenberg as an "old, lame duck." Schwarzenberg and others demanded Dobeš fire Bátora, and the junior ruling TOP 09 party boycotted the government's budget hearings until the matter was dealt with. Dobeš initially stood by Bátora but eventually agreed to reassign him within the ministry saying Bátora agreed to no longer make inflammatory comments.

In a brief statement before the media Oct. 14, Bátora said that was a promise he was no longer willing to keep.

"To prevent Dobeš from being exposed to a conflict of loyalty regarding my promise of silence, I sent him [my resignation]," he said, adding he has hopes of holding public office in the future.

"It would be suicidal for me to gamble with the support of my future voters. Voters who, if the intentions to destroy me would have succeeded, would have searched in vain for a similar relevant political force that would defend the conservative values, civil liberties and state sovereignty that are vanishing day by day."

Just what his plans are, and who those future voters might be, remains a mystery. But analysts say Bátora's stint with the ministry was a carefully calculated plan orchestrated by Bátora and Dobeš in an effort to boost Bátora's public profile in advance of his official entry into politics.

"The Education Ministry was a promotional campaign for him," said Jiří Pehe, a political analyst and head of the left-leaning think-tank the Center for Social Market Economy and Open Democracy. "He was never going to settle down as a good civil servant and serve the state. This was something that was agreed upon in order to give him visibility. Now he's a nationally known figure. If you'd asked about him six months ago, no one would have known who he was."

The move made sense for the junior-ruling VV's Dobeš, as well, Pehe said. Given VV's high-profile but dwindling popularity, the party is looking to reboot its agenda. Bátora could provide the two with some common ground.

"VV, at this point, are political zombies, and they can really only be revived if they find some sort of new impetus," Pehe said. "I don't think Bátora will necessarily be able to align himself with any of the more reasonable members of the party, like [Deputy Prime Minister] Karolína Peake, but there is definitely a part of VV - the part represented by people like Dobeš - who just for the sake of saving their own political futures might want to cooperate with him."

Far-right ambitions

Dobeš originally brought Bátora into the ministry in February, when he tried to appoint him his deputy minister. He instead made him director of personnel, a position Bátora held until the spat with Schwarzenberg, when he was reassigned. Bátora, who is the head of the far-right conservative group D.O.S.T. and a former political candidate for the ultra-conservative National Party, has made headlines over the years with scathing remarks about various minority groups. Dobeš allowed Bátora to remain in his employ despite considerable public outcry and requests from within the government to remove the polarizing figure from his department. Bátora's statement referred several times to the "discrediting campaign" and "lecherous methods" used to try to pressure Dobeš to fire him, including branding him an anti-Semite who could not be trusted as an employee of a ministry charged with educating children.

Bátora, who is rumored to be planning the creation of a far-right political party and who is said to have the support of President Václav Klaus, said he contacted the judiciary in hopes of creating a slander case against his many critics but was rejected by the courts.

Political analysts are split, however, on whether or not a true far-right movement can take hold in the country.

"The chance for a nationalist right-wing party with a neo-liberal program is here," Milan Znoj, a political scientist at Charles University told The Prague Post in September. "The number of like-minded voters is growing. Czech nationalism is different from Polish and Hungarian nationalism, but room for such a party is being created."

But Pehe said he doubts there is much appetite among voters for an ultra-conservative message. And if such an agenda ever were to take root, it would be pushed by a leader far more charismatic than Bátora.

"If any movement like this gets off the ground, they need someone who comes across less threatening and more politically acceptable," he said.

"Even if Klaus backed something like this, I doubt it would have much resonance. But I think Klaus is smart enough that if he decided to back a nationalistic project, he wouldn't do it with a second-rate figure like Bátora."

- Klára Jiřičná contributed to this report.

Jack Buehrer can be reached at
jbuehrer@praguepost.com