Řeporyje Mayor Pavel Novotný of ODS told his party’s congress four years ago that all it would take for him to leave as a member is an SMS from Petr Fiala. If he were kicked out of the party for bad behavior, he added, he would continue to work secretly for it for free anyway as an adviser on PR and media. Novotný now says that he deserves to be expelled, and ODS’s board took the first step in this direction yesterday. What happens next is critical for a party wanting to remain in power after the next parliamentary elections. Andrej Babiš of ANO knows better than anyone how disgruntled former party members or associates – Pavel Telička, Ivo Vondrák, Dita Charanzová – can be used by the media to air dirty laundry in public and damage a political party. And Novotný is much better than any of them at attracting attention and throwing dirt. If ODS doesn’t find a way to remain on good terms with the enfant terrible of Řeporyje, it might discover just how dangerous his foul mouth can be.

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