Final Word from Thursday, May 16, 2024

One of the first political references to Andrej Babiš in our database is from late 2011, just before Babiš launched ANO. He told HN that corruption in the country got out of control when Mirek Topolánek of ODS became PM in mid-2006. Topolánek got offended and told HN that his unofficial aide, Marek Dalík, met with Babiš just once and that Babiš showed him a list of all the people in ODS he was paying off, with amounts. A short time later Euro published copies of Babiš's StB file. While addressing yesterday's assassination attempt on Robert Fico, PM Petr Fiala of ODS told CNN Prima News that he always tries to use a vocabulary that isn't likely to cause offense and that it's Babiš who is conducting a negative campaign every single day. Fiala skipped over the fact that he accused ANO at the ODS congress of not being a democratic party, but he's otherwise basically right. It was Babiš and the reaction to him over the past decade that caused the big split in Czech society, with no end in sight. [ Czech Republic shot shooting division rupture Slovakia ]