00:00Krzysztof Zufal is a 23-year-old IT specialist who lives in Prague.
00:04On Saturday, he joined tens of thousands of other Czech citizens at a major anti-government
00:09rally.
00:09The ruling coalition is made up of three parties – Prime Minister Babiš's Populist
00:14Anno Party, the Eurosceptic Motorists for Themselves, and the far-right Freedom and Direct Democracy
00:20Party.
00:21Like many others, Zufal came to Letna Plain to protest what critics describe as democratic
00:26backsliding.
00:26Actually, my first time being at an event like this, I think now I'm conscious enough
00:36to know that showing up matters.
00:39I am here today because I am not pleased with how parts of our governments are behaving, be
00:50it towards the country, be it how they represent our country internationally.
00:55The organisers of the rally, the Million Moments for Democracy movement, say that more than
00:59200,000 people filled Letna Plain.
01:02They say they want to prevent the country from following the path taken by neighbouring Slovakia
01:07and Hungary.
01:08We are afraid that we are following the path of Robert Fico and Viktor Orbán, that we are
01:15going to see destruction of public media.
01:20We are going to see attacks on civic society and NGOs, and it's currently happening.
01:26And we are really afraid about the state of democracy.
01:33So the very aim is to show our civic strength, that we are many, that we are hundreds of thousands,
01:40and we will do everything so that the Czech Republic stays as a strong democracy.
01:49A similar rally last month in Prague in support of President Petr Pavel drew tens of thousands
01:55of people.
01:56The President had clashed with the government over his refusal to appoint a controversial
02:00ministerial candidate from the Motorists' Party.
02:03Protesters on Saturday warned that the government's cuts to defence spending, changes to public media
02:08funding and draft legislation on tighter rules for NGO funding could weaken democratic institutions
02:13in Czechia.
02:14Demonstrators also accused the government of shifting toward more pro-Russia positions.
02:19Prime Minister Babiš has rejected these allegations, saying his policies are unrelated to Russia
02:24and that NGOs should not be involved in political campaigning.
02:28At the last four years, we had a good government here in the Czech Republic, but it changed a half
02:34year ago.
02:35And the new Czech government is, like, really bad.
02:39They don't want to work in the European Union, which is important for me.
02:44I think we should aim toward the Western countries.
02:48We should be supportive of the EU, and we should keep our independence from Russia.
02:55This is not the first mass protest of its kind in Czechia.
02:58In 2019, a quarter of a million people turned out for a rally against Andrei Babiš during
03:04his first term as prime minister.
03:06At the time, protesters accused him of corruption and demanded his resignation.
03:12People are afraid, because for the first time, the government is composed of three parties.
03:22One of them is extremist party, far-right party, pro-Russian party, which is quite dangerous
03:28in current political global situation.
03:31When there is a Russian war, when Donald Trump is very chaotic, and you don't know what will
03:37happen in next year.
03:38So people are very afraid what will happen in our country.
03:42The politicians, seeing this many people together, will actually realize that they cannot just
03:49do whatever they want to do.
03:52I really don't want us to go down the way they, for example, did in Slovakia.
03:56For Christoph Zufal and many others who joined the rally this weekend, this is about more
04:01than politics.
04:02It's about the direction their country is taking.
04:05Zufal says he feels both skeptical and hopeful, uncertain about the future, but encouraged by
04:12the scale of public support.
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