Voters in the Czech Republic will begin going to the polls on Friday to choose a new president for the next five years. The elections, which are usually held over two days, will begin at 2 p.m. local time on Friday and end at 10 p.m., followed by 8 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Saturday. Incumbent President Milos Zeman, who has faced accusations of overstepping his constitutional boundaries, is not eligible to run due to the two-term limit. If no candidate wins a majority of the votes in the first round, the race will narrow to the top two in a runoff on January 27-28.

Opinion polls suggest that it will take a second round to choose the country’s next leader in what appears to be a neck-and-neck race between former Prime Minister Andrej Babis, retired Gen. Petr Pavel, and economist and academic Danuse Nerudova. While the president’s role is mainly ceremonial, it also holds the role of commander-in-chief of the military.

All three leading candidates have controversial issues relating to their past that they have taken flak over. Babis has faced trial over fraud allegations connected to a €2 million EU subsidy in September last year. He was acquitted from the lawsuit just four days ago. Pavel was a member of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia

Article by Prague Forum