Babiš wins Czechia's election. The harder vote is still waiting in Prague.

Andrej Babiš had a victory speech ready for the night of 4 October. What he did not have was a government. His ANO movement finished first in the Czech Republic's parliamentary election with 34.51 percent of the vote and 80 of the Chamber of Deputies' 200 seats. Prime Minister Petr Fiala's SPOLU coalition came second with 23.36 percent and 52 seats. Four other groups crossed the threshold, leaving Babiš short of the 101 votes needed to govern alone.

The result was decisive enough to end Fiala's coalition as the governing force and ambiguous enough to make every policy promise conditional. ANO could claim a mandate to negotiate. It could not claim a mandate to rewrite the country's foreign policy by itself. The likely partners — the anti-migrant Freedom and Direct Democracy party, known as SPD, and the right-wing Motorists — had campaigned against parts of the European Union's climate and migration agenda and questioned the scale of support for Ukraine. Their combined 28 seats and 13 seats respectively would give Babiš a majority, but also give each a veto inside a new administration.

President Petr Pavel held the constitutional key. He did not immediately appoint a prime minister on election night. He first met the parties, then on 27 October asked Babiš to lead talks on forming a government. That step reflected the election result, not a completed coalition. By the end of the month, the central story was still being negotiated: could Babiš assemble a workable cabinet without turning Czechia's European and security commitments into the price of entry?

The election therefore changed who would set the agenda in Prague before it settled what the agenda would be. Babiš had returned to the centre of Czech politics with his best result since ANO entered national government. The institutions around him — the president, an outgoing coalition, an EU member state with a strong Ukraine policy and a parliament of six groups — remained in place. The next test was whether his catch-all campaign could become a coherent governing programme.

A result built from six different Czechs

The official count showed a fragmented but orderly ballot. ANO won 80 seats. SPOLU, the three-party alliance of the Civic Democratic Party, KDU-ČSL and TOP 09, won 52. The Mayors and Independents took 22, the Pirates 18, SPD 15 and Motorists 13. Turnout reached 68.95 percent, with 5,621,717 valid votes. Six groups in a 200-seat chamber is a substantial change from a two-bloc contest, but it is not the same as a six-party government.

ANO's number was larger than most pre-election expectations and larger than its 2021 result. Babiš used a message that combined lower prices, opposition to further austerity and a promise to make Czech interests heard in Brussels. He presented himself as a practical manager who could restore the purchasing power of households and protect domestic industry. On foreign policy, he avoided a clean break with the West while criticising the government's approach to aid and procurement for Ukraine.

Fiala's SPOLU defended its record on energy security, defence spending and support for Kyiv, but voters punished the coalition for inflation, higher mortgage costs and a style of government that often sounded more confident in European meetings than in Czech living rooms. The coalition remained the main pro-EU force in parliament, yet it lost the ability to build a majority with the parties that had governed alongside it.

STAN and the Pirates preserved a liberal, pro-European space, though neither could offer Babiš the numbers he needed. STAN's 22 seats made it a potential alternative partner in a different arithmetic, but its campaign had treated an ANO-led government as a strategic risk. The Pirates' 18 seats put them in opposition after a campaign focused on digital government and anti-corruption rules. The electoral map rewarded opposition and dispersed the possible governing centre.

SPD and Motorists turned protest into parliamentary leverage. SPD's platform was hostile to irregular migration, the EU's Green Deal and what it described as an open-ended military commitment to Ukraine. Motorists, whose appeal mixed cultural conservatism with hostility to environmental regulation, attracted voters who wanted a louder challenge to Brussels. Neither party could govern alone. Together, they could make Babiš's return dependent on positions he had kept deliberately flexible.

Babiš's comeback is personal, but the mandate is institutional

Babiš had already served as prime minister from 2017 to 2021. His return was built around recognition as much as ideology: voters knew his business background, his confrontations with the media and the European Commission, and his ability to campaign as both insider and outsider. ANO's organisation is unusually centred on its founder. That helped it turn dissatisfaction into a national result, but it also meant that coalition partners were negotiating with one person whose political brand had to absorb every compromise.

The former prime minister made the result sound like a national instruction. He said ANO would seek a government that improved living standards and kept Czechia in the European Union and NATO. That formulation reassured markets and foreign partners without answering the questions that made the coalition talks difficult. Would the government continue the Czech initiative that bought artillery ammunition for Ukraine? Would it support EU sanctions? Would it challenge the bloc's climate package in council votes? Would it accept the defence spending commitments agreed by NATO allies?

Each question carried a domestic constituency. The ammunition initiative had become a point of pride for the outgoing government and a source of criticism from the far right. The EU's climate rules affected carmakers and coal regions as much as they affected emissions targets. Defence spending competed with pensions, schools and energy subsidies. Babiš could promise to protect all of them in a campaign; a cabinet would have to put figures in a budget.

The president's role added another constraint. Pavel, a former army general and former chair of NATO's Military Committee, had been elected as a pro-Western counterweight to Babiš. He could not veto ANO's election victory, but he could demand clarity about ministerial candidates, conflicts of interest and the constitutional duty of a government to honour international commitments. His consultations signalled that the coalition process would be tested in public, not concluded in a party office.

That matters because Czechia's constitution gives the president discretion in appointing a prime minister but makes the chamber's confidence indispensable. Pavel could ask Babiš to form a government, as he did on 27 October, yet Babiš still had to present a cabinet and obtain a confidence vote. The election created the first step. It did not create the majority.

The coalition arithmetic points right — and in three directions

A three-party ANO-SPD-Motorists coalition would command 108 seats. It is the simplest route to a majority, but not a simple government. SPD wanted stronger national control over migration and a referendum mechanism it said should include questions about the EU. Motorists wanted to roll back parts of the Green Deal and secure ministries where they could shape transport and industry. ANO wanted the premiership and the finance, interior and regional-development portfolios that would allow it to deliver its economic promises.

The parties could agree on opposition to Fiala before the election. Governing would force them to define what they meant by ‘Czech interests.’ On Ukraine, Babiš had said military aid must be examined for cost and effectiveness; SPD leaders had criticised deliveries and argued that talks with Russia should take priority. On the EU, ANO was more transactional than SPD, seeking changes to rules while remaining inside the institutions. A coalition agreement would have to turn those differences into language that could survive council meetings and parliamentary votes.

A minority ANO government with outside support was another possibility. STAN or individual opposition deputies could abstain on confidence and vote issue by issue. That model would give Babiš room to keep distance from SPD's most radical positions, but it would make every budget and foreign-policy vote a fresh negotiation. The experience of Fiala's coalition had shown how quickly a narrow majority can become a public argument about who is really in charge.

The outgoing SPOLU parties faced their own decision. They could refuse any cooperation and rebuild in opposition, or offer limited support on European and defence issues to prevent a sharper turn. Such a deal would risk alienating voters who had just rejected their government. It would also require Babiš to share credit with politicians he had spent the campaign blaming for the cost-of-living squeeze.

The president's consultations were therefore about more than protocol. They provided a public timetable in which parties had to declare whether they were prepared to take responsibility for a coalition. Babiš's negotiating advantage was the 80-seat lead. His vulnerability was that every partner knew he needed them and that a failed first attempt could force him to bargain with parties he had called the old establishment.

Foreign policy was on the ballot even when it was not the headline

The campaign was fought mainly over household finances, but foreign-policy consequences were visible in the coalition map. Since Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Czechia had positioned itself as one of Kyiv's most active Central European supporters. It welcomed refugees, supplied weapons and used the ammunition initiative to mobilise purchases from outside Europe. Babiš did not promise to abandon NATO or the EU. He did promise a more conditional approach to aid and a government less willing to accept decisions made elsewhere.

The distinction between ending support and auditing it became the central area of ambiguity. ANO could say that every shipment should be checked against Czech security and finances. SPD could say that the old policy had been defeated at the polls. Foreign capitals would hear both messages. The Kremlin would look for signs of a weaker regional coalition; Kyiv would look for continuity in deliveries and political backing; Brussels would look for a government that still participated in common sanctions and defence planning.

Energy policy linked the domestic and international questions. Czechia had worked to reduce dependence on Russian gas and oil, but industrial electricity prices and the future of coal remained politically sensitive. Motorists and parts of the ANO base opposed what they saw as an expensive transition designed in Brussels. A new cabinet could demand exemptions or delays without leaving the EU climate framework. The argument would move from campaign rallies to Council working groups, where Czech votes could help build a blocking minority or a compromise.

Defence spending presented a harder test. NATO allies had agreed a higher long-term target in The Hague in June, with core defence spending and wider security investments defined separately. Babiš's coalition partners questioned the scale and timing. The Czech army's modernisation contracts, including air defence and armoured vehicles, were already in progress. Cancelling or delaying them could save a budget line while weakening a capability that Prague had promised to allies. Preserving them could expose Babiš to the charge that he had broken his campaign pledges.

The election did not answer any of these questions. It changed who would answer them, and it made the answer dependent on a coalition whose parties used different vocabularies for sovereignty, solidarity and security. For European partners, the relevant signal was not ANO's vote share alone. It was the text of the coalition agreement and the names of the ministers who would represent Czechia abroad.

Pavel's mandate is a brake, not a steering wheel

President Pavel's consultations gave him a chance to draw red lines around the formation process. He had campaigned on the credibility of Czech institutions and on the country's place in the transatlantic alliance. Asking Babiš to lead talks recognised the electoral result, but the appointment did not settle questions about the former prime minister's business interests or the suitability of proposed ministers.

Babiš's Agrofert conglomerate had previously been at the centre of disputes over conflict-of-interest rules and EU agricultural subsidies. Any new appointment would be examined through that history. The president could request explanations and refuse to appoint a particular minister, but he could not run the coalition negotiations himself. His leverage came from delay and public scrutiny, while Babiš's came from the prospect that refusing the election winner could be portrayed as ignoring voters.

The first weeks after the vote were also a test of whether institutions could maintain routine work while the government changed. Fiala's cabinet remained responsible for current affairs. European Council meetings, budget preparation and defence commitments continued. A caretaker ministry could keep officials at the table, but its authority to make new long-term decisions would be limited. The longer coalition talks lasted, the more practical questions accumulated.

That timetable favoured a negotiated agreement before the new Chamber convened for its first session. The official results showed that six groups had crossed the threshold, and the chamber's committees would need to be constituted before legislation could move normally. Babiš therefore needed not only a coalition but also an agreement on the chamber's speaker and committee chairs. Institutional control would determine which disputes could be delayed and which would reach a vote.

Pavel could slow the process if he judged a proposal unconstitutional or politically unworkable. He could not produce the compromise that the election had withheld. His role was to ensure that the next government emerged through the constitution and could command confidence. The substance of that confidence remained a negotiation among Babiš and the parties whose programmes were further apart than their seat totals suggested.

What Europe should watch after the celebration

The Czech election was a domestic contest with a European afterlife. The first marker will be the coalition text. If it speaks broadly about EU membership and NATO while avoiding commitments on Ukraine, the new government will be able to postpone a rupture. If it includes explicit limits on aid or a challenge to the Green Deal, the shift will be visible before the first Council meeting. Wording will matter because Czechia's influence comes from being a reliable participant in coalitions, not from its size alone.

The second marker will be the budget. Babiš won on the promise of relief for households and industry. The state still has to finance defence, pensions and energy support within European fiscal rules. A coalition that cuts investment to fund immediate tax relief could face pressure from Brussels and the bond market. A coalition that protects spending could disappoint the voters who made ANO the largest force. The finance minister will be more consequential than the election-night speech.

The third marker will be the government's relationship with the president. Pavel's support is not necessary for every policy, but open conflict would signal institutional instability and make ministerial appointments harder. A working arrangement could give Babiš space to pursue a more transactional EU policy while preserving the country's security line. A confrontation over ministers or foreign commitments could send the coalition back to the chamber before it had begun.

Finally, the parties must decide whether their campaign language can be translated into administration. SPD's appeal was built on permanent opposition to migration and Brussels. Motorists built theirs on deregulation and cultural grievance. ANO built its comeback on managerial competence and the promise to make the state work. A cabinet cannot be permanently oppositional. It has to sign contracts, implement EU rules and answer for decisions that are unpopular with at least one partner.

The result of 3–4 October gave Babiš the first move and gave Czech voters a government-making problem. On 27 October Pavel asked the election winner to lead the talks, but the invitation was the beginning of the process rather than its conclusion. The next government will be judged by the coalition it signs, the ministers it appoints and the first budget it sends to parliament. Until then, Czechia has changed its political direction on paper while the road — toward Brussels, Kyiv and the country's own voters — remains under negotiation.