Final Word from Monday, June 4, 2018

Jan Stráský, who accepted the thankless job in 1992 of the last PM of Czechoslovakia, resurfaces now and then to set the record straight, adding a few details each time. He made waves in March 2013 when he said that there was talk in the early days of turning off the lights and letting the clever ones take what they could. He and his colleagues knew that privatization by Czechs couldn't be clean, he said in 2013, because no one had the money. On the other hand, they were rebuked that they couldn't sell everything to foreigners. A third way, he said, was to have banks give loans that weren't repaid. Now he tells Kateřina Perknerová of Deník that someone picked the borrowers but that he doesn't know exactly who it was or how it was done. When Perknerová said that the result is that we have businessmen like Petr Kellner, Daniel Křetínský, Patrik Tkáč, Karel Komárek and Andrej Babiš, Stráský didn't object. Maybe next time he'll give some clues about who picked them. [Czech Republic prime minister Federation Federal PPF Agrofert J&T EPH]