Lubomír Metnar (born 6 October 1967) is a Czech politician. He became a member of the

Chamber of Deputies of the Czech Republic The Chamber of Deputies, officially the Chamber of Deputies of the Parliament of the Czech Republic (, PS PČR), is the lower house of the Parliament of the Czech Republic. The chamber has 200 seats and deputies are elected for four-year terms u ...

in 2021, working as a non-party member of the

ANO 2011 ANO (), registered as ANO 2011, is a right-wing populist political party in the Czech Republic, led by businessman Andrej Babiš, who served as Prime Minister of the Czech Republic from 2017 to 2021. Formed in 2011, the party finished second i ...

movement.

Early life and education

Metnar joined the service of

Public Security Public security or public safety is the prevention of and protection from events that could endanger the safety and security of the public from significant danger, injury, or property damage. It is often conducted by a state government to ensu ...

on 1 October 1987, before becoming an executive three years later. He worked at the Public Safety Emergency Regiment from 1 March 1988 until 23 February 1989. Metnar attended Secondary Police School of the Ministry of the Interior in Holešov from 1992 until 1993, where he was obliged to supplement the education obtained at the civilian school, with a professional security education at the departmental school of the Ministry of the Interior. Metnar graduated from University of Ostrava, receiving the M.Sc. whilst majoring in economics. He served as deputy chairman of the board of VTK Special a.s. until 2015, before becoming member of the supervisory board of the joint-stock company Vítkovice Heavy Machinery until 2016.

Political career

Metnar was a member of the BOS political party, only to have left when some members voted for the Czech Republic to leave

NATO The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO ; , OTAN), also called the North Atlantic Alliance, is an intergovernmental organization, intergovernmental Transnationalism, transnational military alliance of 32 Member states of NATO, member s ...

and the

European Union The European Union (EU) is a supranational union, supranational political union, political and economic union of Member state of the European Union, member states that are Geography of the European Union, located primarily in Europe. The u ...

. He stated: "It is not true that I would ever hold an opinion about withdrawing from these structures." At the end of November 2017, Metnar announced candidacy as Minister of the Interior of the Czech Republic in the First Cabinet of Andrej Babiš. The same year on 13 December, President

Miloš Zeman Miloš Zeman (; born 28 September 1944) is a Czech politician who served as the third president of the Czech Republic from 2013 to 2023. He also previously served as the prime minister of the Czech Republic from 1998 to 2002. As leader of the Cze ...

appointed Metnar to this position.

2018 Czech presidential election

Before the 2018 Czech presidential election, Metnar denied the information that Zeman automatically advances to the second round. It was ironically delivered by Jindřich Šídlo in the talk show ''Šťastné Pondělí'', prior to being distributed in a printed form in a different wording by an unknown person to mailboxes in Ostrava. However, Metnar did not refute the false information about the opponent in the second round, Jiří Drahoš, as they had a different nature of seriousness. At the end of June 2018, Babiš appointed Metnar to his second cabinet, this time as Minister of Defense of the Czech Republic. The latter also resigned as Minister of the Interior of the Czech Republic. On 29 September 2020, together with other members of the cabinet, Metnar called on Armenia and Azerbaijan to stop the

Nagorno-Karabakh conflict The Nagorno-Karabakh conflict is an ethnic and territorial conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan over the region of Nagorno-Karabakh, inhabited mostly by ethnic Armenians until 2023, and seven surrounding districts, inhabited mostly by Azerbai ...

2021 Czech parliamentary election

In the 2021 Czech parliamentary election, Metnar ran as a non-party candidate in the second place as

candidate in the Moravian-Silesian Region. He received 6,481 preferential votes and thus became an MP.

Controversy

In 2018,

Czech Television Czech Television ( ; abbreviation: ČT) is a public television broadcaster in the Czech Republic, broadcasting six channels. Established after breakup of Czechoslovakia in 1992, it is the successor to Czechoslovak Television founded in 1953. H ...

accused Metnar of plagiarism his diploma work, to which he later apologised.

Mikuláš Bek Mikuláš Bek (born 22 April 1964) is a Czech musicologist and politician, who has been serving as Minister of Education, Youth and Sports in Petr Fiala's Cabinet since May 2023. He previously served as the Minister of EU Affairs from December 2 ...

, rector of

Masaryk University Masaryk University (MU) (; ) is the second largest university in the Czech Republic, a member of the Compostela Group and the Utrecht Network. Founded in 1919 in Brno, it now consists of ten faculties and 35,115 students. It is named after To ...

pointed out, that the unintentional omission of a citation or source is also considered plagiarism.

References

External links

{{DEFAULTSORT:Metnar, Lubomir 1967 births Living people Politicians from Olomouc Defence ministers of the Czech Republic Czech police officers Interior ministers of the Czech Republic Members of the Chamber of Deputies of the Czech Republic (2021–2025)