Czech Communists want post-1989 politicians to account to people Prague, ČTK 16 Nov. 09

Prague, Nov 13 (CTK) - The Czech Communists (KSCM) called on post-November 1989 politicians to present to people accounts for the 20 years since the Velvet Revolution during which, they say, the property created in the 40 years of Communist rule has been misappropriated.

The KSCM leadership issued Friday a statement on the 20th anniversary of November 17, 1989, when the events that brought about the fall of Communist rule in then Czechoslovakia started.

The statement says the 20 years of "promises and lying" by the post-November governments and ruling political parties have resulted in the current economic and financial crisis.

A mere cliche has remained from the post-November 1989 ideas of democratisation of society, the statement says.

It claims that a majority of society wished that the socialist social system, work and social certainties be preserved 20 years ago.

The November 1989 leaders, "particularly Vaclav Havel and a part of so called 'dissidents' concentrated around him knowingly lied to people in the Czech Republic from the very beginning," the statement says.

Not the truth and love prevailed and determined the fundamental values of society, but those who were purposefully building neo-liberal capitalist society in which one sole measure - private profit - exists under the veil of moral values, the Communists say.

They refer to Havel's motto that the truth and love will prevail over lie and hatred.

The new political elites broke up the joint state of Czechs and Slovaks (as from January 1993) and the coupon privatisation became the fraud of the century, the statement claims.

It says unemployment has appeared in society and half a million people in the ten million country are without work now.

More than 800,000 people live on the brink of poverty, human health and the right to education have become commodities, society is threatened with mounting crime and corruption, including political corruption, the Communists say.

They accuse the post-November 1989 government of having brought the country to NATO, of sending soldiers to foreign missions and of being servile to the United States and other allies.

The Communists accuse the rightist parties of being ready "to sell the Czech Republic to the foreign military-economic interests of the United States" and to allow building a military base on Czech oil.

They refer to the U.S. plans to build a radar base on Czech soil within the U.S. missile defence shield that Barack Obama's government has scrapped, however.

The two strongest Czech parties, the Civic Democrats (ODS) and the Social Democrats (CSSD), together with their "political satellites" are unable to cope with the current social and economic problems of society, the statement says.

The Czech Republic has lost a substantial part of its state sovereignty when it entered NATO and ratified the Lisbon treaty.

"Vaclav Havel who bears personal responsibility for the developments in the Czech Republic over the past 20 years even publicly and systematically challenges the arrangement of Europe after World War Two," the Communists claim in the statement without elaborating.