Political

As ”definitely important” for quality discharge of a regional council member’s office people regard the candidate’s moral qualities, knowledge of the region’s problems, ability to solve conflicts, ability to express ideas and expert knowledge. As ”quite significant” qualifications for successful discharge of a regional council member’s office the respondents also regarded knowledge of foreign languages, good relations with central bodies, experience with work in public administration on municipal level, spirit of enterprise, administrative experience and university education.

As for opinions concerning the benefit of introducing self-governing regions the Czech public remained significantly ambivalent. Approximately one quarter of the interviewees believe that the introduction of self-governing regions, which have now been existing for four years, was proved right. However, approximately the same part of the respondents holds the very opposite view. Another quarter stated that this issue cannot be judged after such a short time period.

In October survey, the Public Opinion Research Centre investigated whether the interviewed people confide in selected politicians. This time the submitted list included the names of 27 representatives of the parties present in the Chamber of Deputies. The respondents expressed the highest level of confidence in ČSSD leader Stanislav Gross (50 %). He is followed by Mirek Topolánek, Cyril Svoboda, Jan Zahradil, Lubomír Zaorálek, Miloslav Ransdorf and Miroslav Kalousek.

In October 2004, Czech citizens expressed the highest level of confidence in the president of the country. He was found trustworthy by almost three quarters of the respondents. Local councils were found trustworthy by more than a half of the interviewees (62 %). Approximately two fifths of the interviewees trust their regional council (42 %) and also our government (40 %). In comparison with the previous month the government’s position has slightly improved.

All respondents having the right to vote were asked an open question (i.e. without a list of political parties being used) investigating which party they would vote for if an election to the Chamber of Deputies took place the following week (the question was: ‘Imagine that an election to the Chamber of Deputies is held next week. If you participated, which party would you vote for?’). The structure of the answers given is summarised in the table.

All respondents eligible to vote (except Prague citizens, 827 respondents) were asked the following question: ‘The elections to the regional councils are going to be held in November. Will you participate?’ The question was answered yes by 58% of those surveyed (‘definitely yes’ by 25% and ‘probably yes’ by 33%), while 30% said no (16% ‘probably not’ and 14% ‘definitely not’) and 12% did not know.

As a September poll of the Public Opinion Research Centre indicates, people place the greatest trust in persons they know (87% of respondents trust most of them) and in the president (76%). They generally consider the army (62%) and the media, namely television (67%) and newspapers (61%), to be trustworthy. More than a half of respondents are of the opinion that they can believe the majority of people in our country (51%), whereas two fifths are persuaded to the contrary.

In May survey, the Public Opinion Research Centre investigated whether the respondents confide in selected constitutional bodies. The submitted list included the names of 26 politicians (all members of the government, president, ombudsman, chairmen of Senate and Chamber of Deputies, leaders of parliamentary parties and EU-commissioner Špidla). It is unambiguously president Václav Klaus, who is still viewed as the most trustworthy person among our top politicians.

For several months already Czech citizens have been expressing the highest level of confidence in the president of our country. He is regarded as trustworthy by three quarters of the respondents. In our September survey the most significant rise of the level of confidence was recorded in case of the government, now trusted by more than a third of the respondents. The least trustworthy institutions are both chambers of the Parliament.

All respondents having the right to vote were asked an open question (i.e. without a list of political parties being used) investigating which party they would vote for if an election to the Chamber of Deputies took place the following week. The structure of the answers given is summarised in the table.

The question ‘Imagine that an election to the Chamber of Deputies is held next week. Would you participate?’ was answered yes by 60% of those surveyed having the right to vote (‘definitely yes’ by 28% and ‘probably yes’ by 32%), while 31% said no (17% ‘probably not’ and 14% ‘definitely not’) and 9% did not know.