Nearly 80% of Czechs do not trust PM: survey

Almost four-fifths of the population does not trust Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala, according to a new survey published by CVVM agency.

In terms of distrust, about 77% of Czechs distrust Fiala, which is the lowest number among any top politician asked about in the survey, shared only with the Speaker of Parliament’s lower house, Markéta Pekarová Adamová (TOP 09).

In contrast, according to results collected in August and September, Czech President Petr Pavel is currently the most trusted politician in the Czech Republic. The results suggest that Pavel, who took office in March this year, is trusted by 55% of Czechs, making him the only Czech leader with a 50% trust rating.

Opposition ANO party leader and former prime minister Andrej Babiš came in second with a 42% trust rating, while the leader of the opposition far-right Freedom and Direct Democracy Party, Tomio Okamura came third with a 35% trust rating.

However, the politicians of the ruling coalition fare much worse.

Compared to the last survey in April and May 2023, trust in almost all Fiala’s (ODS) cabinet members has decreased.

Foreign Minister Jan Lipavský (Pirates), like Fiala, also received a trust rating of 19% from the public.

These figures may be somewhat misleading, however, as one of the possible answers in the survey was that the respondent did not know the politician in question and therefore could not answer whether they trusted him or not.

This is another major problem with the current government – as the survey shows that people have never heard of most of the ministers. For example, 64% of Czechs do not know European Affairs Minister Martin Dvořák (STAN).

Another CVVM survey asked about trust in constitutional or state institutions. According to this, 25% of Czechs trust the government, while 23% trust the lower house Chamber of Deputies and 33% trust the Senate.

(Ondřej Plevák | Euractiv.cz)