The Kroměříž Proclamation was a petition initiative started on 21 May 2016 by Michael Kocáb, with the aim of finding a candidate for the

2018 Czech presidential election Presidential elections were held in the Czech Republic in January 2018. The first round took place on 12 and 13 January. As no candidate won a majority, a run-off election between the top two candidates, Jiří Drahoš and President Miloš Zeman, ...

who could defeat incumbent Miloš Zeman. Jiří Ovčáček, Zeman's spokesman, said that the Kroměříž Proclamation was a "kiss of death" for any candidate who ran with its support. It was signed by more than 11,000 people. The Proclamation originally intended to support Michal Horáček, but he declined.

Jiří Pospíšil Jiří Pospíšil (born 24 November 1975) is a Czech Republic, Czech politician, who was leader of TOP 09 from November 2017 until November 2019. As a deputy for the Civic Democratic Party (Czech Republic), Civic Democratic Party, Pospíšil se ...

was later speculated to be the Proclamation's candidate.

Petr Kolář Petr Kolář (born 27 September 1962) is a Czech politician. He served as ambassador to Russia from 2010 through 2012. He is currently a senior advisor to the law firm of Squire Patton Boggs in Prague. Early life Kolář graduated from Char ...

was also considered. The Proclamation announced on 15 December 2016 that potential candidates included Marek Hilšer,

Petr Pithart Petr is a Czech given name for males and a Czech surname. Petr is the Czech form of ''Peter''. For information on Petr as a first name, see Peter (given name). Given name * Petr Aven (born 1955), Russian billionaire banker, economist and politic ...

and

Pavel Fischer Pavel Fischer (born 26 August 1965) is a Czech politician and diplomat who has been Senator from Prague 12 since 2018. Fischer previously served as Czech Ambassador to France from 2003 to 2010. He was a candidate in the presidential elections of ...

. Only Hilšer indicated that he could accept the Proclamation's support. The Proclamation organised debates between potential candidates during 2017.

agreed to participate.

and

were considered the most promising candidates, but both decided to not run.

and Marek Hilšer eventually ran with the support of the proclamation, but finished third and fifth respectively and did not progress to the run-off. Václav Němec admitted that Proclamation had been unsuccessful.

External links

Website

References

2018 Czech presidential election {{Czech-stub