Populist billionaire Babis wins landslide in Czech general election
The centrist ANO movement led by populist Andrej Babis won the Czech Republic's parliamentary election on Saturday, France 24 reported, adding the vote shifted the country to the right and paved the way for the Eurosceptic billionaire to become its next prime minister.
With all votes counted, the Czech Statistics Office said ANO won in a landslide, capturing 29.6 percent of the vote, or 78 of the 200 seats in the lower house of Parliament, according to the source.
It is noted that Babis is the country's second-richest man, with a media empire including two major newspapers and a popular radio station. Although he was a finance minister in the outgoing government until May, many Czechs see him as a maverick outsider with the business acumen to shake up the system.
The opposition conservative Civic Democrats came in a distant second Saturday with 11.3 percent of the vote, or 25 seats. They were the strongest mainstream party. The Social Democrats, the senior party in the outgoing government, captured only 7.3 percent 15 seats while the Christian Democrats, part of the ruling coalition, won only 5.8 percent support or 10 seats.
Like most Czech parties, ANO also rejects accepting refugees under the EU's quota system.
ut Babis played down his Eurosceptic views after his victory. "We're oriented on Europe," he said. "We're not a threat for democracy. I'm ready to fight for our interests in Brussels. We're a firm part of the European Union. We're a firm part of NATO," the billionaire said as quoted by the source.