Prague - Until the Velvet Revolution in 1989, the communist party's leading role in the government had been safeguarded by the constitution. Then things changed and for many years it seemed that KSČM would never cease to be an opposition party.
But nothing lasts forever. Professor of economics and former emigree Jan Švejnar, who is tipped to run for presidency next February, believes that after almost twenty years, the Czech society should finally begin to perceive the Communist Party as a legitimate representative of the Left.
Fresh statements of the Michigan University professor, who has been trying to garner enough support among legislators to seriously challenge the popular incumbent and fellow economist Václav Klaus, could start a discussion that has been supressed for a long time: what kind of a party are today's communists?
Renaming? Never
Švejnar is convinced that the time has come to deliberate under what conditions the communists can become a legitimate part of the political system. He admits, nonetheless, that this can happen only with the consent of the public.
But what terms, specifically, is he thinking of? Up until now, Švejnar cautiously mentioned only one: the party changing its name. And that's exactly what the communists refuse to do.
Or seeing Karl Marx and the revolution disappear from the party's program in the near future? The odds are just as low here.
Still, experts say that the communists can be considered a democratic left-wing party. "Karl Marx is a normal thinker, not a criminal. And KSČM is duly registered with the Ministry of the Interior, hence it's legal," argues Pavel Šaradín, a political scientist at the Palacký University in Olomouc.
Demons of the past
However, he admits the party has yet to clarify some unresolved historical issues, recognize its former mistakes, and explain their position on the November 1989 events.
A member of the Czech Senate from the Green Party Jaromír Štětina, notorious for his resolute anti-communist stance, says they should have themselves registered again. "Only this way they would be effectively forced to purge their program of the violence-tolerating Marxism-Leninism," he says.
One week ago, the party publicly declared they have learned from the mistakes and deformations of early forms of socialism.
The party's chairman Vojtěch Filip believes they only need to get the support of the people at the polls and eventually form a government. "It all depends on us, nobody else," said Filip.
But the Social Democratic Party, a virtually exclusive ally of the communists, has two regulations that stand in the way. "The resolutions accepted at the party congresses in Hradec Králové in 1993 and in Bohumín two years later say clearly that any cooperation with the communists on the governmental level is prohibited," reminded Šaradín.
Modernization or revolution?
The party still shelters some old-school revolutionaries opposing the modernization. Both chairman Filip and his deputy Jiří Dolejš have been criticed by them for selling out to the social democratic mainstream.
Dolejš was even labeled by them as a "servant of the world Zionism" and "an anti-communist", who is steering the party towards social democratic rightism.
The leadership of the party however assures that these members have no significant influence.
