ANO Party: Former Communists Join Ranks – Czech Politics

After the October elections, almost half of the newcomers took their seats in the parliamentary benches. With the exception of exceptions, these are younger people, who no longer had even a theoretical chance to “get dirty” with the communist regime that fell in 1989.

But it is also about two new legislators for the ANO movement, Vladimír Kolek (65) and Drahomír Blažej (63). Their recruitment into the party, which took place in the 1980s, is evidenced by periodical applications, which are now stored in the National Archives of the Czech Republic, and Seznam Zprávy obtained copies of them upon request (see documents below).

Unlike Ševčík, however, there is not a single mention of the communist past of these politicians anywhere in public sources. Both men, who today are also active in regional and municipal politics, claim that they “never hid” this fact and stated it in their application to the ANO movement.

“I definitely mentioned it in some questionnaire. But it’s something that doesn’t bother me at all. I don’t care at all,” said Vladimír Kolek, a former black coal mine worker in Karvinsk.

“Can you tell me where you got that information? I don’t deny it, I put it in the application, but are we supposed to go with the banner, or how do you imagine it?” Drahomír Blažej, a former pilot living in Čáslav, responded irritatedly.

The editors also asked the leadership of the ANO movement, which is also headed by former communist Andrej Babiš, whether they are really informed about the past of Kolko and Blažej and how they evaluate it.

“It is up to each person to decide in what detail they will show historical data about all their activities, engagements or memberships on their public profiles,” replied Deputy Prime Minister and 1st Vice-Chairman of the ANO movement Karel Havlíček ambiguously.

The first-mentioned MP Vladimír Kolek claims that he never benefited from joining the party and that it was a condition for him to be the chief foreman at the black coal mine.

“I don’t know if you know it, but the whole principle of why those people were there in that party was that you paid (the party) four percent of your salary. That was the whole result, there was no advantage, at least I don’t know of any,” Kolek claims, saying that his membership was more of a loss. At the same time, he admitted that he had a higher basic monthly income compared to his colleagues.

His surviving application shows that he joined the party in 1984, when he was 24 years old and working at the May 1st mine.

He got to this workplace already in 1981 and led the “mining weak current collective” as foreman. However, at the time of his admission, Kolek was – which he did not mention in the interview – an important functionary of the Socialist Youth Union (SSM). This was preceded by studies at the regional political school, and immediately after graduation he started working as the vacant chairman of the SSM race committee at race 2 – Darkov. According to contemporary documents, he was also a member of the plenary session and the presidency of the district committee of the Socialist Youth Union.

Application to the Communist Party of Vladimír Kolek:

In his almost forty-year-old application, Kolek fully identifies with the basic ideological line of the Communist Party, while in the text he also mentioned his wife’s involvement.

“We are fully reconciled to the religious question, we hold a scientific world view. I am applying to be accepted as a member of the Communist Party, as I agree with the policy of our party and want to participate in its implementation,” wrote in May 1984 the current member of parliament for ANO, who is now a member of the Defense Committee in the House of Representatives and also serves on the standing committees for the control of Military Intelligence and the General Inspection of the Security Forces (GIBS).

Whether it was a mistake and a failure that he joined the party that was the backbone of the totalitarian regime, even after forty years, he cannot answer unequivocally.

“Because I didn’t profit from it in any way, I can’t say whether it was good or bad. For me, it stood like this: Either you will be the main leader – I had the education for it, electronic -, then you will be in the party, otherwise you will not be the main leader,” MP Kolek described the alleged dilemma for Seznam Zprávy. He is still working for the ANO movement as a deputy mayor in Karviná and a member of the Moravian-Silesian Region.

He also told Seznam Zprávám that he ended his membership in the KSČ immediately after the fall of the regime. “As soon as the revolution came, it all ended. I ended up in office, I ended up overtaxing, and that was it… Done, scumbag,” Kolek colorfully described.

His deputy and party colleague Drahomír Blažej, who is also a member of the defense committee, the foreign affairs committee and the permanent commission for the control of the National Security Office (NBÚ), almost did not want to discuss membership in the Communist Party with the Seznam Zpráv reporter.

“I was a pilot – supersonic, fighter – at that time it was quite interesting, very simple pressures and that’s enough. I won’t say more about it,” he responded incoherently.

He joined the Communist Party of the Czech Republic in 1987, i.e. at a time when conditions were more relaxed. He was 25 years old at the time and was still studying at the High Military Aviation School of the SNP in Košice. In his application, he described that his father had died not long before and that he and his wife (serving in the army, who was already a member of the Communist Party) moved to Přerov after her transfer.

At the time, Drahomír Blažej briefly described the reasons why he too wanted to join the party: “I submit my application for admission as a member of the Communist Party of the Czech Republic based on my honest intentions to become a valid and active member of our party for the building of our homeland,” he wrote in September 1987. Not long after, he was accepted, when even the guarantors guaranteed that he was “fully committed to the socialist establishment.”

According to Blažej’s current explanation, being a member of the Communist Party was not an obligation for him, but the circumstances allegedly contributed to it. “I don’t know how old you are, but try to think or ask your dad,” urged Blažej.

Application to Drahomír Blažej’s KSČ:

Deputies Blažej are annoyed that journalists are interested in his pre-November political career and are said to be “not interested” in his later activities. From the available information that he publishes about himself on Facebook, it follows that he most recently worked as a captain at the airline company Smartwings, before that he was a pilot for the Czech Airlines. Everywhere he is titled only as a transport pilot, but he himself indicated more activities in the military environment for Seznam Zprávy.

“I was on two missions, three… but no one asks about that,” Blažej sees the more important moments of his life, which he himself has not reported on yet. Later, at the editor’s request, he added that his first mission was “UNGCI” (UN Guard Contingent in Iraq) and took place in the years 1993/1994, the second there in 1995/1996, then in 1999 he was on the “KFOR” peacekeeping mission in Kosovo, in addition, according to his own words, he repeatedly fulfilled the role of an international observer at the elections in Bosnia and Herzegovina and Kosovo.

At the end of the interview, he refused to answer questions about his former membership in the Communist Party of the Czech Republic, and objected to the remark that as a politician he should be able to face all questions.

“You’re looking for sh***, instead of looking for normal things and looking at whether the person did or didn’t do something,” responded vulgarly Blažej, who is also a representative for ANO in Čáslav and a member of the Central Bohemian Region.