The highest constitutional officials will meet at the Castle, including Lipavský

Update: 26.05.2023 18:06

Prague – President Petr Pavel will meet again on Wednesday with Prime Minister Petr Fiala (ODS) and the presidents of both chambers of the Parliament, i.e. Miloš Vystrčil (ODS) and Markéta Pekarová Adamová (TOP 09). Senate press secretary Lada Faldynová informed ČTK about this today. Foreign Minister Jan Lipavský (Pirates) will also take part in the meeting, the topics should include foreign policy coordination and the upcoming NATO summit in Vilnius.

The meeting of the President with the Prime Minister and the heads of the House of Representatives and the Senate will take place unusually in the morning, shortly before the meeting of the upper parliamentary chamber, which is to approve three of Pavlo’s adepts as constitutional judges. Two of them – the former president of the Supreme Administrative Court, Josef Baxa, and the former president of the Judicial Union, Daniela Zemanová – were not supported by the Senate’s constitutional and legal committee this week. On Tuesday, the human rights committee will decide on the fate of the candidates.

Even Pavlo’s approach to the government’s actions is not without reservations, as critics of the current president anticipated. Although Pavel signed the controversial amendment limiting the June valorization of pensions to less than half, he was also prepared to have the norm reviewed by the Constitutional Court, to which the opposition ANO movement eventually turned.

The President criticized the government for the form of presentation of its steps, for example the cancellation of Czech Post branches. “I do not consider it right at all that these reforms are planned from the center, without participation and getting to know the perspective of the affected municipalities,” he said last week. This week, he invited a debate on individual items of the government’s austerity package to consolidate public finances. According to the head of state, it is necessary to consider whether the negatives outweigh the positives.

The meeting of all four top constitutional officials will be the second in a row. They met together at the beginning of February at the seat of the upper parliamentary chamber, Pavel then still being the newly elected president. He took office only in March after taking the oath prescribed by the constitution. After the February meeting, he interpreted the agreement that the top four constitutional officials should meet regularly once every quarter and that they would coordinate their activities in domestic and foreign policy. “It is definitely not my goal to do any kind of independent foreign policy,” said Pavel. His predecessor Miloš Zeman did not take the same approach.