The Czech presidency: After you, Vaclav

Date: 18/01/03

Vaclav Havel leaves much behind him, but no heir

IT REALLY is the end of an era. Vaclav Havel retires on February 2nd, after ten years as the Czechs' president and an earlier three as president of what was then Czechoslovakia. A playwright, and the country's most famous dissident under the Communists, his exit breaks a last link with the revolutions of 1989, which ended totalitarian rule across the continent in a few stunning months.

When he first took office in the revolution's heady aftermath, his country's political and economic future looked shaky. Nobody knew how the Czechs would adapt to capitalism; what would happen to the still-powerful secret police; and whether the then Soviet Union would not try to keep some grip on Central Europe. Twelve years on, such fears seem fanciful. Now his country is a solid member of NATO and should join the European Union next year.

No less miraculous is Mr Havel's own staying power. He has survived Czechoslovakia's grumpy but peaceful divorce, the Czech economy's collapse and revival, and his own ill health. Elsewhere, most of his brave counterparts from the resistance era, such as Solidarity's hero, Lech Walesa, proved hapless in office. Mr Havel, by contrast, blossomed into a statesman. Some say his stature matches that of Czechoslovakia's revered founding president, Tomas Masaryk.

The big success was abroad. Mr Havel's stature helped win NATO and EU membership. He has been a stalwart western ally, sending Czech servicemen to Kosovo and Afghanistan, and brushing off terrorist threats to disrupt a grand NATO summit in Prague, the Czechs' capital, last autumn. He has also spoken up admirably for his country's beleaguered minority of Gypsies.

Yet, at home, many Czechs are unenthusiastic. His manner is awkward. Too often he comes over as too remote, too intellectual. His speeches about civil society can be rambling and waffly; they strike no chord in the grimy decrepit industrial towns of northern Bohemia. Poor Czechs are too miserable to hear him; the rich ones too busy and greedy.

The biggest criticism of Mr Havel is the lack of a political heir or legacy. His mainly ceremonial job gave him little chance to build a political base; no party stands clearly for his blend of humanitarian, liberal, communitarian ideas.

Instead, parliament on January 15th failed, in two rounds of voting, to pick a successor from a rum bunch of presidential hopefuls. Vaclav Klaus, a former prime minister who despises Mr Havel almost as much as his ideas, got most votes in the lower house but not enough in both houses to clinch the job. The senate preferred Mr Havel's friend, Petr Pithart, an old dissident chum, whose standing has been damaged by years of political shilly-shallying. Jaroslav Bures, a former justice minister who was the ruling Social Democrats's first choice, was knocked out.

That opens the door for a showdown between Mr Klaus and another former prime minister, the jovial Milos Zeman, who will throw his hat into the ring for the next bout, starting in a week or so. His liking for a smoke, banter and a drink or three would go down well in the pubs at home. But, quite unlike Mr Havel, he could well prove an embarrassment abroad. Hardly surprising that the Czech anarchists, who once teased the Communists side by side with Mr Havel, are now calling for a return to monarchy.