IN TODAY’S politics, it pays to be a mediagenic plutocrat. In the Czech Republic, the man to beat is Andrej Babis, a media mogul and billionaire who is also the country’s finance minister. His ANO (“Yes”) party is far ahead in the polls, and he is favoured to win national elections in October. On January 11th the rest of the Czech political establishment teamed up against Mr Babis, passing a law that would ban cabinet ministers from owning media firms or more than a quarter of any company pursuing state contracts or European Union subsidies. The law received an overwhelming 72% of the vote in parliament.
If the aim was to drive Mr Babis out of politics, it does not appear to have worked. On January 29th he confirmed he would comply with the law by placing his business holdings in a trust. “I am really excited about the moment when neither you nor any other journalist can ask me about my companies because they won’t be mine anymore,” Mr Babis wrote in an e-mail. The law may in fact have strengthened his position, by helping him to portray himself as a political outsider.
There was never any doubt about the law’s target:...Continue reading
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