On Monday, during the 25th anniversary of the Velvet Revolution, demonstrators carried banners reading “down with Zeman” and “we do not want to be a Russian colony”. As the president unveiled a plaque to the students involved in the 1989 protest, he was booed, jeered and pelted with eggs. Though Mr Zeman appears not to have been hit, German President Joachim Gauck was struck during the attack.
The Velvet Revolution or Gentle Revolution was a non-violent transition of power in what was then Czechoslovakia. The period of upheaval and transition took place from November 16/17 to December 29, 1989. Popular demonstrations against the one-party government of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia combined students and older dissidents. The final result was the end of 41 years of Communist rule in Czechoslovakia, and the subsequent conversion to a parliamentary republic.
Anger in the Czech Republic has been growing against Zeman as critics accuse him of betraying the commitment to human rights enshrined by Vaclav Havel, the hero of the Velvet Revolution who became Czechoslovakia’s first post-communist president. Zeman’s opponents cite his pro-Russian stance in the Ukraine conflict, recent praise of Chinese leaders on a visit to China and comments seen as downplaying the police crackdown 25 years ago.
He also used a strikingly vulgar term in explaining in a live radio broadcast why he did not consider the Russian punk group Pussy Riot — who spent time in a Russian prison camp over hooliganism charges — political prisoners. To cries of “Resign! Resign!” and “Shame! Shame!”Czechs pelted President Milos Zeman with objects including eggs, sandwiches and tomatoes as he stood side-by-side with the presidents of Germany, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia. “I’m not afraid of you!” Zeman retorted to the crowd, while security guards shielded him. “Twenty-five years ago, it was dangerous to go out on the streets. It required courage. I was among the demonstrators then. It is cowardly of you to come here and pelt us with eggs.”