• 26/12/2022
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Austrian: I want a strong challenger against Babiš - Novinky.cz<

Austrian: I want a strong challenger against Babiš

Will STAN come with its own candidate for president, or will you submit a proposal on behalf of the entire government?

If it were possible to find a person who could represent all governing parties, it would be an ideal constellation.

Can you imagine five different parties agreeing on one person?

We will definitely try. At least we'll try to talk about it. I don't think that STAN has the ambition to come up with his own person that he would like to nominate for the Castle. But we want to be active and talk about names and challengers...

Against Andrej Babiš.

You have to tell yourself that he will be the person who will run against Babiš here.

There was also speculation about you...

There has been speculation about you for a while, you will rise to the top after the elections, people say that you could be president. Suddenly you're third in some survey and you think: Shouldn't I try? But then you sit on the couch at home next to your kids and wife and say to yourself: Don't be silly, kid, you're 43, you have a family and you've been in high politics for four years. And if you admired Václav Havel, which I always admired, then he was a man with a life story that already came there ready-made.

I feel that I still have a lot to learn, both in politics and in life.

I might make it to the second round, but doesn't my participation in the second round mean that the other candidate will almost certainly win? So, I urge and request all those who want to run for office and are planning to do so, to go through a great deal of rational consideration, whether their ambition is stronger, the adrenaline of watching the election results, or the result as such.

Do you personally have a specific name chosen?

I won't say it yet. But I want the candidate to really feel that he will win, that I am voting for the winner. Someone who can handle the campaign from contact to the last debate, who will have a winning drive.

Three months after the elections, how are your relations in the government coalition of five?

Perhaps to the surprise of many, the coalition of five is still holding together very firmly. We are at the beginning and have not passed any major tests.

And what about the Pirates, who created an analysis criticizing the STAN movement in the election campaign?

Publication of the analysis that journalists had before us , worsened the atmosphere in the short term. Now that we are in the government and working together, the everyday working life has strengthened the coalition again. Relations improved.

Even with the head of the Pirates, Ivan Bartoš?

My relations with Ivan Bartoš are not burdened by anything now. We can talk and it's better than maybe two months ago.

You have been at the Ministry for a fortnight. Did you have enough time to look around?

The search is hectic. The Government in general and the Home Office are not entitled to any defence. We started on Friday and on Monday I headed the Central Crisis Staff, which deals with the management of covid. I say quite frankly that the range of the interior from the post office to the secret service is so wide that I haven't even had enough to talk to all the relevant people from each area in those 14 days.

Apart from police chief Švejdar, you should have met with all the leading representatives. Did it happen?

It happened, we have regular Tuesday management meetings. I had special meetings with the head of the Office for Foreign Relations and Information (ÚZSI) Marko Šimandl, the police chief and General Vladimír Vlček from the fire brigade. I was on a trip to the post office with the director of the Czech Post (Roman Knap, editor's note), where we had the opportunity to talk.

Besides the conclusions regarding the end of the police chief, are there any other personnel changes?

We have not made any personnel decisions in any of the other organizations yet. I think that the Supervisory Board of the Czech Post will probably not remain in the same composition for a long time. Now there is the Association of Regions of the Czech Republic, there is the Union of Cities and Municipalities, we also want the Association of Local Self-Governments. As such, mail will require some intervention.

What do you think are the domestic priorities in the government's program?

Activities of the Central Crisis Staff to be the institution where decisions are made in crises. Then there is the preparation of more complex crisis legislation, revision of crisis plans for various areas. I will mention the area of ​​blackout, energy insufficiency. I don't want to scare anyone, but experts say it's not a question of if the blackout will come, but when it will come and how long it will last. We have the ambition to have this legislated and plans for all levels of management. I want mayors to have plans for all types of crises – be it a pandemic crisis, an energy crisis, and others – what to do, who to activate, what structures to secure. I also hear from General Pavel, who said that he is working on this matter individually. I welcome any know-how, it is possible to cooperate.

How do you feel about police reform?

It's Mrs. Columb. There is a lot of talk about her, I have heard about her in the Security Committee for three years, but I have never seen her. Last year, Interior Minister Jan Hamáček and Police Chief Švejdar said that they did not want to burden such an important step with the pre-election atmosphere.

We have to realize that crime is changing, it is moving significantly into cyber space. A specialized workplace will be tasked with the reform. It will require investment in technology. The question is what to do with the terrorism section, if it will remain under the NCOZ or if it will be a separate unit.

Could you imagine a separate cybercrime unit?

Yes, I can imagine that the NCOZ could focus more on economic crime and the specific type of organized crime that is here. But I would like us not to create a conflict environment here between someone who prepares the reform at the bureaucratic table and those who lead the department. It has to come together. My task is to moderate the discussion and come to the security committee in the parliament with something to present in the mid-term.

What are the other tasks of the police?

Analytical workplaces, how to work with data, who should have access to it, so that it cannot be misused. A major systemic problem of the police is the leakage of information from files.

Among the departmental priorities is the Czech Post...

I would like the Czech Post to be a point of contact with the modern, digitized state administration even for people who do not have digital competence and will not be able to control the state from mobile or computer. To access the option of various checkpoints and the like. That is much more important to me than her selling commercial moose type products. If it would be possible for the Czech Post to be a meeting point for the electronic state administration even in more remote parts of the country, that would be wonderful. Rather than the ladies at the counters and letter carriers leaving the post office, I see personnel reserves in middle management.

What proposals for new laws will you want to push for your department?

It is definitely a crisis legislation where we want a comprehensive revision. And one important piece of legislation that is not just domestic is the creation of a legislative framework for the position of National Security Advisor. I also asked the prime minister to work on it quickly. It would be super fast to have this feature built by July 1st, but I don't think it's going to happen. However, I would like it if we have it ready by the end of the year and it goes through the legislative process smoothly so that we have this position at the government level from next year.

What should such an advisor do?

He should also coordinate the activities of secret services. To force the government to give realistic terms of reference to the services and devote themselves to their work. The services here work well, and perhaps sometimes the information from them for the strategic decision-making of the state is used unfortunately little.

Has the government already decided what will happen to Michal Koudelka, the now-only authorized director of the Security Information Service (BIS)?

The decision has not yet been officially discussed in the government, but Prime Minister Fiala's answer was, and he certainly he will observe that we will start dealing with the matter as soon as the government is complete, which happened this week. I think the resolution of this matter is a matter of weeks.

Should Koudelka be reappointed director of BIS?

I have not changed my opinion and I have always said the same: I think so.

You also mentioned security clearance. How do you personally feel about her?

I only have her by law as the Minister of the Interior. I've never had a position where I had to apply for it, and now I don't have to by law. I know it sounds alibi, but I was a teacher and mayor before and didn't have to deal with it.

And are you planning to apply for it anyway?

I was also thinking about having it applied for, because it's pretty good when you don't just rely on the law and prove that you're following it there is nothing wrong.

What did you say to Police President Jan Švejdar at the meeting in the House of Representatives on December 7?

I told him quite frankly that I was very dissatisfied with the tweet that appeared (about the threat of the departure of ten thousand of unvaccinated people from the police, editor's note). He explained to me that he meant it differently, that the interpretation was not accurate.

I talked about the fact that it caused bad reactions and we were forced to react and it turned against us. Instead of doing a positive campaign for police officers to get vaccinated, we ended up in a situation where the police chief will say that many of them will leave.

Another thing that I mentioned there as some substantive reservation was: For three years you have been talking about a reform that no one has ever seen, this should have moved on. , how effective he will be and what the police chief will emphasize is simply different. But I definitely refuse, and I really didn't say at that meeting, because I would never allow myself to do it as a person who was not in that position: You leave, we will replace you, we will dismiss you.

And what came out of your mouth?

On the contrary, I told him, and I hope the police chief will confirm this, that I would like to hear his personal decision from him when he returns to work on January 3.

The police president said this week that he understood from your statement that you as a minister and the whole government would want someone else in his place. And that it was said unequivocally.

From my position, and now I speak for myself and I do not want to speak for the entire government, I really think that the function of police chief as I would imagine its performance can be performed in a better way.

In the corridors of the government, it was said that the reason why you do not want Švejdar in office is that you do not want to reap the fruits that your predecessor Jan Hamáček (ČSSD) sowed.

I really would not like the principle, that someone will bring the chief of police, that he is Babiš's, that is Hamáčk's. I want the election of the police chief according to the law. I want to go through the standard process. The main thing is that the person has respect in the police and people have the feeling that he commands the police in a good sense of the word. Because it is extremely important for the police and its stability. By the way, for example, the fire brigade now has such a chief (Vladimíra Vlček, editor's note).

Do you think Švejdar had no respect? Over the years, he went through practically the entire police force.

I had impeccable information about Mr. Švejdar as the regional police director. That he's an honest guy and an honest cop. Anyway, yes. But these are not the only competencies that a police chief should have.

So there was no sentence like: When will you resign?

No. I didn't ask like that. We agreed to see each other on January 3rd and then we will discuss how things will go on.

So what was your wording?

As I have already stated, I certainly did not say: Submit your resignation. But I certainly expressed my subjective judgment that I would perhaps have a slightly different idea of ​​the performance of the function of police chief.

The topic now is the mandatory or optional vaccination of members of the security forces. Various petitions and appeals arise because of this. Is the government's opinion and your personal opinion already clear?

The government's opinion is not yet clear. Minister Válek officially told us that by mid-February he wants to present and have ready a draft decree on vaccination.

I have the current numbers, and I would like to praise the police, because there are now more than 34,000 vaccinated members of the Police of the Czech Republic, which is 85 percent of people in the service. About 15,000 of them are vaccinated with a third, booster dose. So I think that now the atmosphere in the police force has shifted a bit towards getting vaccinated. But we don't see the 34,000 people who got vaccinated, and rather we hear the noisier, more pronounced minority who didn't get vaccinated.

We are preparing a questionnaire to find out why and for what reasons they did not get vaccinated. But finally, I think, even after experiences from abroad, that the members, the people on the front line who save lives, themselves come into contact with a huge number of people and protect themselves, their families, relatives and others when they are vaccinated .

There are still fifteen percent of those who say that if you force them to be vaccinated by decree, they will leave the police. Aren't you afraid of a more massive departure?

Of course, you're always afraid of it, it's always an unpleasant decision, but you have to make a final decision at a certain moment.

I think it is necessary for all of us across society, professions, not excluding the security forces, to educate ourselves and counter misinformation. Even the security forces' environment is not immune to them.

How do you want to counter them?

The strategic communication of the government in relation to disinformation is another thing that I think is important. I have already started internally, we are working here on the creation of an ad hoc "covid disinformation" group, where there should be analysts from us, who are excellent by the way, as well as analysts from defense and possibly other ministries, and there should also be professional communicators, who will be able to create campaigns that will then be released into the public space as a kind of counterattack against misinformation.

Against what for example?

Perhaps the current most dangerous misinformation and simply used in relation to the omikron mutation is this: Look, the vaccination doesn't help, it takes two doses, and you keep letting it in stab something. And the answer, based on expert numbers and data, is: If you didn't have those two doses, a lot of you would die.

In connection with you, the Chcípl pes initiative talks about several criminal charges related to funding, including the STAN movement.

I know of one that relates to the time when I was still the mayor of Kolín. It is about the fact that they claim that we should have an internal legal department, and we have external lawyers, for which the city of Kolín spends two million crowns per year by decision of the city council.

When I joined the town hall in 2010, my predecessors left me legal services worth ten million crowns a year. We reduced them below two million per year. I consider this my success and not my failure. And I'll be happy to explain this matter to the police. The fact that someone here burdens the police with criminal reports because they ideologically disagree with me about vaccination is such a fashion. I'm not really afraid of it.