Communists want to renegotiate coalition agreement

The Communists want to renegotiate their seven-point agreement with the minority coalition government, saying the original did not anticipate a pandemic situation, party chairman Vojtěch Filip told reporters on Friday.

Prime Minister Andrej Babiš’s government is the first since 1989 to rely on the support of the Communists. In exchange for their support, the largely unreformed anti-Nato, anti-EU party has won several major policy concessions.

Two years ago, the Communists negotiated a program with seven priorities, including a steady increase in the minimum wage, the valorization of pensions, and taxation of church restitution.

Speaking before a meeting with the Minister of Finance on raising the budget deficit to 500 billion crowns, Filip said he had told Babiš that “substantial” changes could be discussed by the Party’s Central Committee on June 20.