Pavel attracted Zeman’s voters with his self-confidence. But Babiš did not fall, on the contrary, according to the expert
won by one million votes, Petr Pavel defeated his opponent Andrej Babiš in the final of the presidential election. The former head of NATO’s military committee received 3.3 million votes. It is the clearest result of a direct presidential election to date. Sociologist Jan Herzmann explained in an interview for Aktuálně.cz why the pension general won and why the defeated chairman of the ANO movement cannot be written off.
Petr Pavel won with the largest gain of votes and the largest margin in the history of direct presidential elections. What is your first impression?
What was expected was confirmed. All polls from the first week after the opening round were in agreement. In that Petr Pavel will win by a relatively large margin. The differences between them were really minimal. It turns out that the map remains about as it was. Some peripheral parts rather vote for Andrej Babiš, as do some inner peripheries. The majority of the republic elects Pavel.
That majority is dramatically pronounced. He won all but three of the regionals, a two-fold increase from the first round. Where did such support come from?
If we put his result from the first round together with the results of Danuš Nerudová, Pavel Fischer and Marko Hilšer, we would get the map obtained by the regions practically the same. He didn’t have enough to defeat Andrej Babiš by himself, but together with them, he had enough in the newly acquired regions. That was the main reason why he won.
He also managed to mobilize some of the voters who did not participate in the first round. Probably especially in Prague and the Central Bohemia region. These two factors clearly decided in his favor.
He defeated Babiš by almost a million votes. What does that number tell you?
The number confirms how divided Czech society is in relation to Babiš. He has around 40 percent supporters and the rest are against him. This division has been present for a long time. I don’t want to say that it necessarily had to manifest itself, but in the end it rather manifested itself. Babiš definitely does not have majority support in society yet.
Am I offering another interpretation of Babiš’s result?
The division into Babiš’s supporters and opponents is not only determined by the division into city and countryside. It is confirmed that it is given by the overall climate in some parts of the countries. I mean the dissatisfaction, the feeling of people that they live in forgotten and marginalized locations. There are no high incomes, enough health care or kindergartens. People there tend to vote against the government rather than for a specific candidate.
The motivation to vote is different where the problems are smaller or easier for people to deal with because they have higher incomes and can arrange an alternative to what is not working. There they wanted a less controversial, more consensual candidate.
Pavel as an alternative for Zeman’s voters
President-elect Pavel received 3.3 million votes. In the Czech Republic, we have never had a candidate with such a wide range of companies. How did he come to this?
When it comes to straddling, Jiří Drahoš was very similar in the last election. He just didn’t beat Miloš Zeman. Pavel was a candidate that people vote for because they would be completely passionate about him. He is not the idol of Czech voters, but he is an acceptable representative from many points of view. An acceptable compromise.
It is clear that Pavel had to attract a large part of Miloš Zeman’s former voters. Can we guess how much?
We do not have exact data on how many votes he received in the second round from former Zeman voters. But we have the results from the first round. These indicate that he actually obtained a certain portion of them. I think there are positive and negative reasons for this.
Negative in the sense that some of his supporters left Zeman. Confidence in his person is around 30 percent. Since it used to be two-thirds, the remaining third sought an alternative. And it turned out that he no longer became Babiš to a sufficient extent, but rather Pavel.
And what was the positive reason?
It consisted in the fact that many of Zeman’s voters admired Pavlo’s self-confidence and the calmness with which he appeared in the campaign. Maybe it was sometimes redeemed by not saying much. But in short, it seemed confident. In my opinion, he made an impact on a significant part of Zeman’s supporters. Moreover, it seems to me that Zeman has significantly reduced his support for Babiš in the last two weeks.
Mobilization against Babiš and for him
Voter turnout exceeded 70 percent. Did you expect one?
moreover, introduce yourself to me. I said on commercial television Thursday night that I expected a turnout very close to 70 percent. That’s why I’m not surprised by the number. During the campaign, the situation escalated in society, there were strong emotions. Pavel was driven by mainly positive emotions, negative ones prevailed towards Babiš. And whenever the choice is accompanied by strong emotions, it brings higher participation.
Andrej Babiš acknowledged defeat and congratulated the elected president Petar Pavlov. | Photo: CTK
Babiš launched the most heated campaign in the history of direct elections against Pavlov. He indirectly identified him as the person who brought the Czechia into the war in Ukraine. Didn’t he discourage people who were simply too much for such a campaign?
There is a debate about this. I have to say I probably do. But the conclusion mobilized a lot of people for their support, gathering 2.4 million of them. That’s really a lot. in the end, the result of Jiří Drahoš in the last presidential election was evened out. Although he lost dramatically more with Pavlo than Drahoš with Zeman. In any case, it is an excellent investment for Babiš in his further political activity.
Nevertheless, Babiš lost three elections in a row, moreover the most watched ones. In his case, isn’t that the main message?
This is a very complex question. For many people, this can be a signal that they are always being beaten, that someone is always defeating them, and that is why they finally need to be helped. On the one hand, losing an election is no glory. However, losing the election but getting a million more votes than his movement in the elections to the Chamber of Deputies is a sure message.
Another thing is related to this. The fact that the ANO movement lost very narrowly to the current government coalition in the parliamentary elections. As an individual party, however, it was clearly the strongest. Space is being created for YES to go to the next elections also in the form of an alliance.
5.8 million people went to the polls, 3.3 million voted for Petr Pavel. What does this tell a sociologist about the state of society?
I wouldn’t dare say that at all. We will see how the response to the results will be. I saw a certain message already in the campaign. Society is deeply divided, even internally hostile. This is bad equipment for a time of crisis. In a crisis, it is always better for the company to pull together. And now it looks like she can do no such thing.
Why do you think?
We did encounter a positive assessment of how society behaved towards Ukrainian refugees. But let’s overlook that a relatively small part of people actually behaved this way. It is clear that it would be good to calm the social atmosphere and that Petr Pavel should try to do that as president. This is a completely clear thing. But how he should achieve this, I dare not say.
Elected Petr Pavel in his staff at the moment when victory was certain. | Photo: CTK