Czech conservative MEP and co-founder of the EU’s European Conservative and Reformist group (ECR) Jan Zahradil will not seek another mandate in the 2024 EU elections, he announced on Monday in Prague.
Zahradil represents the more conservative branch of the Czech Civic Democratic Party (ODS, ECR), now the strongest party in the governing coalition.
He will remain a member of the Parliament until the elections in June 2024. However, he will be immediately replaced as the head of the Czech delegation to ECR by MEP Veronika Vrecionová. Vrecionová will also become a vice-president of ODS, which was the position held till now by Zahradil.
“This is something I have been thinking about for a long time. In politics, you rarely have the luxury of deciding for yourself when and under what conditions you will end a chapter of political activity. Fortunately, this has happened to me now,” the Czech conservative MEP said.
In 2009, Zahradil was elected president of the Alliance of Conservatives and Reformists in Europe (ACRE), later transforming into the ECR Party. His successor as ECR’s president is Italian Prime Minister and Brothers of Italy leader Giorgia Meloni.
In the 2019 EU elections, he was the ECR spitzenkandidat for the post of president of the EU Commission.
Zahradil now wants to focus on Czech national politics and strengthen the voice of national conservatives within the governing ODS party.
(Aneta Zachová | EURACTIV.cz)
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