He doesn’t live in Prague, an opponent snapped at Nacher after the elections. The court has a different view
After the elections, the Prague Municipal Court received a proposal that Patrik Nacher be given the mandate of a Prague representative. Reason? Although Nacher has a permanent residence in Prague, he actually lives in Munich, thirty kilometers outside the metropolis.
According to the complainant, Ondřej Mirovský, he lives in Prague permanently only formally.
“How can someone claim this about me?” Nacher responds, and it is clear from his voice that he was clearly touched by the accusation.
“The last three mayors were born in Olomouc, Bratislava and Slavičín. I was born in Podolí and could watch the Velvet Revolution on Wenceslas Square from the living room. I have lived in Prague all my life, first in Opletalov and since 1994 in Prosek. I work in Prague every day, I even play sports – I play table tennis for Start Praha,” says Nacher.
The leader of Prague’s ANO went to primary, secondary and college in the capital. He also works in Prague, runs a business and owns two apartments – in Opletalov, where his mother lives, and in Prosek. In addition, for the last eight years he has been sitting in the City Council of Prague on Mariánské náměstí and, since 2017, in the Chamber of Deputies on Malá Strana. However, he and his wife bought a house in Mnichovice, where the family now lives.
“It is known that I am a workaholic, because of work I often sleep over in Prague. Will someone count for me how many days I sleep in Prague and how many in Munich?” asks Nacher.
The Great Ping Pong Battle
The author of the proposal to recalculate the election result due to the ANO candidates is Ondřej Mirovský, a member of the Greens, a former representative of the capital city and councilor of Prague 7. This year he ran from the 23rd place of the Solidarita coalition, but was unsuccessful in the elections.
His complaint also concerned three other candidates of the ANO movement. It was based on the electoral law, according to which only citizens of the given municipality can stand and vote in municipal elections.
“My goal was not to deal with the media. And there is no personal grudge involved. I made the motion because it personally annoys me when people suddenly appear on the list of candidates even though they don’t live in the city. I assume that the court will throw it off the table, but I consider it right to open these things,” says Mirovský.
She is fairly well acquainted with Nacher. They sat together in the Capital City Council and competed in a televised debate on TV Barrandov. Above all, they are united by their passion for table tennis. Nacher defends the colors of SK Start Praha based on Strělecké ostrov, Mirovský starts for Slovan Bohnice. In the current season, according to the Elo coefficient, Mirovský is ranked 201-250. place and to Nacher 501–600 place.
“I’m a little better. I will always beat him,” Mirovský proudly reported in an interview for the iDnes server in 2018.
In the sports annals, only one mutual match from 2015 can be found. Mirovský played on home soil, his Elo coefficient then showed a value of 1383. Nacher could boast of Elo 1310. The seven-year-old match was deeply etched in the memory of both opponents.
“Na uses material. He has a sandwich there, and I can’t play against that,” Nacher recalls years later. A “sandwich” is a special surface that some defensively minded players stick on their bats. It gives the ball a different spin when hit than the no “stuff” bat that most players use.
How did the elections in Prague turn out?
“He was a bit angry and rude. I have a sandwich and he swears at it. He didn’t like that, he’s not used to it. A sandwich is such an ugly cover, I admit that,” says Mirovský today with a laugh.
The match then sounded convincing for Mirovský. They won clearly 3:0 in three sets.
Only a proven connection to the municipality is sufficient
In the 2022 municipal elections, on the other hand, the representative of Start Prague has the upper hand. The municipal court upheld Nacher and Mirovský’s motion to revoke the mandate he refused.
According to judge Slavomír Novák, the verification of whether or not Nacher actually lives in Prague is completely inappropriate. He would undertake a closer examination only in case of reasonable doubt. Ownership of a house outside the territory of Prague is not enough to raise such doubts, the judge stated.
“In the case of elections to municipal councils, the fact of residence of individual voters in a given specific municipality and their participation in the life of this municipality is also essential,” the resolution reads.
Nacher has a long-term permanent residence in Prague, and is also politically involved in other ways in the capital, the judge reminded. According to attorney Pavel Uhl, the courts decide this way quite normally.
“The jurisprudence of the courts is based on the ruling of the Constitutional Court from 2011, which says that citizenship in the municipality is absent in the material sense of the word, only if there is no none custody. If, for example, a person works in that area and has a permanent residence there, even if he actually lives elsewhere, then this is not a problem. In practice, it is sufficient for the courts if the candidate provides evidence of any bond,” explains Uhl.
The Municipal Court in Prague rejected other complaints that the candidates in this year’s municipal elections do not live in their district. For example, a complaint against Ivan Babické, who ran on the TOP 09 list for the Prague 18 municipal council, or against four candidates for ODS and TOP 09 in Prague 4, namely Ondřej Kubín, Zdenek Kovařík, Patrik Op and Lucia Gramelová, was unsuccessful.