Early parliamentary elections were held in mid-June 1998, following the events of the previous autumn. The result did not offer many meaningful coalitions. A coalition of the ČSSD, KDU-ČSL and US or ODS, KDU-ČSL and US would have had a majority. The unresolved situation between the ODS and the US effectively ruled out their right-wing coalition cooperation; therefore, a coalition of the ČSSD with two smaller centre-right parties was offered, but this was paralysed by the specific personality of Miloš Zeman. According to memories of the negotiations from that time, the KDU-ČSL preferred a coalition with the ČSSD and the US and waited for a better offer. But something happened that few expected. The two seemingly irreconcilable political rivals, Miloš Zeman and Václav Klaus, who had built the previous years of their political lives on their hostility to each other, recalled their former collaboration in the forecasting institute from the communist era and discovered that they could eliminate the hated small parties and agree on a joint project of governance. The ČSSD had 74 seats and the ODS 63, so together these parties had 137 seats. The constitutional majority, which the duo of parties amply exceeded, amounts to 120 seats. It should also be noted that ODS and ČSSD also had a comfortable majority in the Senate at that time. Thus, the division of functions and “business” interests did not stand in the way.
The opposition agreement, entitled “Agreement on the Creation of a Stable Political Environment in the Czech Republic between the Czech Social Democratic Party and the Civic Democratic Party”, was concluded on 9 July 1998. The best indication of the moral background of the whole transaction is the long list of signatories to this agreement on both sides. Some of the signatories are still guilty of extensive economic non-transparency; Ivo Svoboda, later Minister of Finance, was convicted of embezzlement of entrusted assets. On behalf of the ODS, Václav Klaus, Miroslav Beneš, Libuše Benešová, Milan Kondr, Ivan Langer, Miroslav Macek and Vlastimil Tlustý signed. Miloš Zeman, Stanislav Gross, Petra Buzková, Vladislav Schrom, Ivo Svoboda, Zdeněk Škromach, Vladimír Špidla and Zdeněk Vojíř signed the opposition agreement for the Czech Social Democratic Party.
The contracting parties, i.e. ODS and ČSSD, have committed themselves by the opposition agreement to the implementation of social democratic governance in a single-colour cabinet by having ODS MPs leave the chamber during the vote of confidence in Zeman’s government. There was also a commitment not to vote against the government for the entire term of office. The signatories were to allow the election of ODS representatives to head both houses of parliament and other positions of control, to submit proposals for the Constitution and related laws that would strengthen the importance of the results of the political party competition , to forbid agreements with other political entities, and to try to eliminate parliamentary debate by agreeing important points between the two parties in advance.
On the basis of the opposition agreement, Miloš Zeman was appointed Prime Minister by President Václav Havel a few days after it was signed. Subsequently, in the planned absence of ODS MPs, the government was given a vote of confidence by its own MPs. As can be seen from the voting records from that time, MPs from both political parties voted very often in accordance.
However, the vote of the ODS MPs in favour of the submitted bills on the state budget, or at least allowing its approval, proved difficult to digest later.
The situation regarding the state budget law escalated at the beginning of 2000, which began in the budget provisional period after the draft submitted by Zeman’s government was not approved. In the context of negotiations on the situation, a series of agreements were then concluded on 26 January 2000, outlining the content of legislative items for the remainder of the parliamentary term. These were as follows:
Agreement on the 2000 State Budget and Budget Outlook,
Agreement on the basic parameters of the change to the electoral system,
Agreement on the Czech Republic’s preparation for EU accession,
An agreement to mutually define the substantive terms of minority government tolerance,
Agreement on communication between parliamentary clubs,
collectively referred to as the Tolerance Patent. This shifted the opposition agreement into the role of a full-fledged coalition cooperation.
But let’s go back to the summer of 1998. After Zeman’s government gained confidence, an unprecedented purge began. Zeman himself described his cabinet as a government of suicides, for who else could begin to return the Klaus-burnt country to its former glory. The composition of the government itself was remarkable. It included, with a few bright exceptions, incredible caricatures of the era of one-party rule. Among the gerontocratic cadres, let us mention Miroslav Grégre (69), Václav Grulich (66), Antonín Peltram (68) and Jaromír Císař (69). To this group of veterans and protagonists of the planned economy, it is necessary to add other outcasts who were supposed to clean our country’s hands: Ivo Svoboda, Jaroslav Tvrdík or Jan Kavan. The average age of its members was also record-breaking.
There was a real draught in the state-owned enterprises, which were still very numerous at that time. Members or sympathisers of both opposition parties were appointed to the management of large industrial companies, contracts began to be concluded that were completely unfavourable to the state or to the state-owned enterprise, and last but not least, the process of repossession of some unsuccessfully privatised companies, their debt restructuring and subsequent re-sale began.
As an example of the stark difference between the pre-election promises with the rhetoric of cleansing the country of corruption and clientelism and the reality that emerged after the elections, we can recall the promise that non-partisan experts would be nominated to head state-owned enterprises. This was confirmed just a few days after the government was appointed, when the Ministry of Industry and Trade sent a “completely non-partisan” expert to the board of directors of Ostrava-Karviná Mines, namely the party’s deputy chairman Vladislav Schrom. Thanks to the opposition agreement, Oldřich Vojíř, Deputy Chairman of the ODS, was nominated to the Supervisory Board of ČEZ.
And it wasn’t a charity-style operation, he came into quite a bit of money there, 13.2 million to be exact. He got it by selling 140,000 shares in this semi-state company. These he could previously buy as an officer of the company as part of an incentive programme. When the price of the shares rose, he sold them at a profit of around CZK 100 each. And this could go on in hundreds of cases where politicians of both parties have latched on to the state like leeches and sucked and sucked.
At that time, none of the later oligarchs had sufficient wealth to control certain ministries or the entire government. However, it was during the dark period of the four years of the Opposition Treaty that some formerly small or medium-sized businessmen came very cheaply to acquire large shareholdings in formerly state-owned companies and thus earned their later influence over the state and politicians. At this time, they also gained incredible influence through the existence of purely criminal characters such as František Mrázek or Radovan Krejčíř.
