The world really won’t help us! A lawyer from the Prague movement goes to the polls without chaos
06/09/2022 20:32 | Conversation
Attorney Monika Hášová is running as number four for the Prague council on the candidate list of Prague without chaos. “I am sure that we will not disappoint the voters’ trust. We have expertise and experience, great determination to make order and a system in traffic, parking, bicycle transport in Prague, to change the approach of the Municipal Police. I am not the only one with ambitions, we are a team and as such we will also act and act after the elections,” Hášová enumerates in an interview for ParlamentníListy.cz why she should vote for the new movement.
In the 2010 elections, you ran for TOP 09. In 2017, you stood by Pavel Sehnal’s side, and you also ran for his Alliance for the Future last year. Was it difficult for him to persuade you to continue working together?
Everything in life and in politics has its time and its development. The TOP 09 club completely broke up after 2014 and it was a shame. Pavel Sehnala for at least 10 years and I respect his tenacity and intelligence. People who have built something in their lives, who want to help public affairs and change what we all don’t like, should enter politics. Like Pavel Sehnal, I respect our leader Jarda Ďuriš, who was a successful director of the Transport Company hl.m. of Prague and who is very angry about the way Prague is managed today and how the people of Prague suffer from stupid mischief and the incompetence of the leadership. It annoys me anyway, and that’s why I gladly accepted the offer to run with these personalities.
- BPP
- Lawyer based in Prague
You are number four on the list of candidates for the Prague council, what are your electoral ambitions?
We are a new movement, we will see how the people of Prague will react, whether they will give us the opportunity to get involved in events in Prague and the opportunity to influence important things. I am sure that we will not disappoint the voters’ trust. We have expertise and experience, great determination to make order and a system in traffic, parking, bicycle transport in Prague, to change the approach of the Municipal Police. I am not the only one with ambitions, we are a team and as such we will act and act after the elections. Each of us has our own role in which we have and understand it, I don’t want to act like the current leadership – trial and error.
How will you use your advocacy experience for politics?
survey
As an MP, would you vote for a vote of no confidence in the government?
voted: 36216 people
For politics, legal education is very beneficial, the more practice, the better. I already have 37 years of working life behind me, in the local council I was the vice-chairman of the Legislation Committee, the Control Committee. I know the running of the whole municipality very well, it’s great to read the contract and know who it benefits … I don’t need to spend public money on outside legal counsel. During my tenure, I completely changed the approach to the election of the judges of the Municipal Court in Prague – our lives are not decided by 80-year-old pensioners, policemen, employees of the Ministry of the Interior, etc… now active and educated forty-year-olds are elected, and that’s fine.
What main topic will be key for this year’s Prague elections?
I think that even at the level of Prague, it will be a topic of outrageous energy prices, the associated decline in the standard of living of all Prague residents. If there is no energy, there is a risk of the collapse of manufacturing companies and the entire economy. No, I don’t want to scare you, I’m an optimist in life, but the world won’t really help us. The statements of the Speaker of the House should be set in stone! Her party colleague, Minister of Health Válek, is considering resigning if the government does not provide energy for hospitals…
The energy crisis makes wrinkles on the foreheads not only of households and companies, but also of many town halls, how do you think Prague will handle it?
Prague cannot influence Pražská energetika as, where it does not have a majority in favor of the people of Prague, but the company Pražská plynárenská as is in the hands of the capital, and the management of Prague can effectively and take appropriate steps in favor of the people of Prague. Prague without chaos would start acting without delay, we don’t know what steps the current leadership is taking, because they don’t inform us. There will be elections, so I think they are not looking too far ahead. How will Prague handle it? That will depend on how the new Prague Council is composed.
Should the government somehow intervene in solving the problems of cities and municipalities with energy supplies and prices?
The government should certainly act decisively, the coalition has the support of 108 votes in the House of Representatives and thus feels practically unthreatened. I can see the opinions of the citizens around me, they are all dissatisfied, they are afraid and they know that the real crisis is yet to come. For example, I talk a lot with pensioners, I represent single mothers. Obtaining any kind of state support or allowance is so labour-, time- and technically demanding that most old people, for example, have no chance at all to apply. I am based on practice and the current state, the government is neglecting the citizens and I am afraid that it will not change much.
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author: Barbora Richterová