UPDATE 3-Czech president, PM in rift over proposed govt

...

By Jan Korselt and Jan Lopatka

Czech President Vaclav Klaus and rightist Prime Minister Mirek Topolanek disagreed on Thursday over a proposed coalition government, delaying an attempt to end more than six months of deadlock in parliament.

Topolanek's rightist Civic Democrats, the centrist Christian Democrats and the Green Party reached a deal earlier in the day to form a government, and handed the proposal to Klaus.

The three parties have just 100 seats in the 200-seat lower house, and will need the support of rebels from the leftist Social Democratic Party to survive a confidence vote required by the constitution once a government is appointed.

But Klaus, who has opposed appointing a government that would rely on rebel deputies saying it would not be stable and has urged several times the formation of a grand coalition, refused to set a date to appoint the proposed cabinet, instead asking Topolanek to strike a deal that includes the leftists.

"I have to say that I differ with the prime minister in opinion on the method of pushing through the government which he aims to take," Klaus told journalists after the meeting.

Klaus said if the parties could not reach a deal on broader support for the government, he would like to see a quick move toward early elections, and feared that Topolanek's plan would not achieve this.

Topolanek said the three-party government was the best way out of the crisis as it would bring about needed reforms to public spending, and pension, social and health care systems.

Klaus is under no time limit to appoint the government, and the country has seen its strong economy ride out the current political turmoil without a hiccup.

But analysts said he may be bound by the constitution to eventually accept Topolanek's proposed cabinet, and added the country needs a quick solution to the crisis so a government can take power and cut a growing budget deficit to create conditions to adopt the euro currency after 2010.

"Klaus's step is against the constitution. He must appoint the government, he has no other option, that is clear according to the constitution," said political analyst Josef Mlejnek Jr.

"It looks like we're in for a nice skirmish now."

At a separate news conference Paroubek, who fought bitterly with the rightists during the election campaign, re-iterated that his party is still willing to find a compromise with Topolanek on support for a government.

"We still consider this way (a cabinet with majority support) to be open and possible ... the Czech Republic can hardly afford further experiments with confidence votes that don't have the guarantee of a positive result," he said.

Analysts also said Klaus may be hoping that an agreement between the Social Democrats and the Civic Democrats will include a pledge to re-elect him in 2008. The Czech president is elected by parliament, not the people. ((Writing by Alan Crosby, editing by ; prague.newsroom@reuters.com; Reuters Messaging: alan.crosby.reuters.com@reuters.net; +420 224 190 477))

Keywords: CZECH POLITICS/

[PRAGUE/Reuters/Finance.cz]