President Petr Pavel's visit to the Liberec region, April 26, 2023. Tram ride from the city center to Lidové sady.
Liberec – During his evening meeting with people in Liberec, President Petr Pavel criticized the government's communication with the public. He can't properly sell and explain the things he does well, he said. Already in the afternoon, he criticized the government of Petr Fiala (ODS) for communicating with regions and municipalities about the cancellation of branches of the Czech Post and tax offices.
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“The government really doesn't communicate what it does very well. I'm not saying that everything it does is done well. Certainly some things could be done better. But even the things it does, it doesn't know how to sell properly, it doesn't know how to explain properly. And this also reduces the good it will do to the public. It is something that harms not only this government, but the entire country,” said Pavel. According to him, the government's bad communication causes a lot of negative emotions, so this will also be a topic he wants to discuss with the prime minister at the meeting on May 2.
According to the president, people would understand many of the measures that the government is taking if it properly explained them. In addition to negative emotions, according to him, the government gives the opposition, including the extreme one, free ammunition, which it can then use very successfully and to some extent radicalize people who are dissatisfied. “If they got a satisfactory explanation, they might not even go to the demonstrations, but because they don't get that explanation, or what they do get, it seems to them more like arrogance than an explanation, so it's off to the streets it drives,” the president said.
One of the topics where poor communication is a big problem, according to the president, is pension reform. According to him, reform and consolidation of public revenues are necessary. “We are borrowing more and more for our pensions and we are getting into a situation where we are already approaching the debt trap, because interest payments from those loans are already putting a significant burden on the state budget,” he pointed out. He assured that he is ready to debate the issue and the moment there are any alternative proposals on the table, he is ready to moderate the discussion.
