Praha Sobě: He is running in the elections through a backup political association
Jan Čižinský confirmed that Praha Sobě will compete in the September municipal elections as well as the battles for the town hall in 14 Prague city districts. However, they are no longer called Praha Sobě, nor did they manage to obtain the necessary roughly 95,000 signatures from the people of Prague to compile civic candidates, i.e. seven percent of the city’s population. They will run as a political party “We support the independent candidate PRAHA SOBĚ”. According to the leader of the current candidate, the petition sheet was signed by 92.5 thousand residents of the metropolis.
“Security”
“We could have managed to collect the signatures in the revised deadline, but just like last time, our candidate for signatures would certainly become the target of legal actions,” argues Jan Čižinský on social networks. They say they faced two lawsuits last time and it only came out “by a whisker”. “In those four years, about 70,000 people applied for permanent residence in Prague, which is great for Prague, but this increased the legally required seven percent minimum of required signatures from 91,000 to 97,” Cecílie Antůšková comments for Blesk.
In addition, the municipality of the last election period in 2018 subtracted part of the petitioners from the sheet of the group Praha Sobě. In the first phase, he found out the total number of Prague citizens on the petition and verified the details of the petition header on the individual petition sheets. In the second phase, he checked the completeness of data for all petitioners. In the third phase, he verified individual petitioners in the population registration information system; in the fourth phase, he checked duplicates. 5,393 bad signatures were subtracted this way.
“In this year’s elections, the City Hall would m of Prague proceeded in a similar way, i.e. in all four phases described above,” says municipality press spokesman Tadeáš Provazník. This is a standard procedure, suspicions and unverified information are not followed by the registration office. “I would just like to add that since the last election period, in cooperation with the Ministry of the Interior, we have been able to improve the procedure for verifying signatures so that the whole process is much faster and more efficient,” supplies.
However, a read signature does not necessarily mean a forged one. Such conduct would have to be concretely proven and can be criminally prosecuted. “In the case of incorrect data, these are usually petitioners who filled out the record illegibly or incompletely, petitioners who actually live in Prague but are not registered for permanent residence, petitioners who do not have citizenship of the Czech Republic or another EU member state, etc. “, informs Tadeáš Provazník.
The opposition is clear
“They had the established association as insurance since 2018 and now they were just scared that the control would be better and in greater numbers, so they preferred to submit a candidate as an association straight away,” said Alexndra Udženija (ODS), mayor of Prague 2. Accordingly, it may be disappointing for some supporters of this electoral party that Prague she had to use a purpose-built movement to participate in the elections, and the idea of a grouping of independent candidates no longer applies.
Criticism of signature collection
The opposition and some residents further criticized Praha Sobě for collecting signatures in inappropriate places. “The Electoral Party of Prague did not manage to collect enough signatures for them to continue acting as independent candidates, despite the fact that that often their petition stands were placed in places where charity concerts were held, in front of polling stations, which I consider immoral to say the least.” thunders Alexander Uzheniya.
However, according to the spokesperson, they always took care to maintain decorum. “Criticism mostly comes from those whom Praha Sobě and I stepped on with our actions and prevented their dealings with public finances,” claims Cecílie Antůšková.
Among other things, their main goals are to complete large projects such as the construction of metro D, the reconstruction of the Industrial Palace or the project to complete the Blanka tunnel. “After the elections, we would like to cooperate with democratic parties and people who are not connected to godfathers, are not criminally prosecuted, or neighboring activities are not connected to political causes,” concludes Cecílie Antůšková.