(Bloomberg) -- A Czech opposition group promising to slash government spending and reduce debt overtook billionaire Prime Minister Andrej Babis’s ANO party in the vote count following parliamentary elections, partial results showed.
The coalition SPOLU, consisting of three center-right parties, had 27.47% of votes after 98.18% of polling districts were counted, data from the Czech Statistics Office showed on Saturday. Babis’s ANO party was second with 27.41%, followed by a center-left group led by the Pirate Party with 15.38%.
While a defeat for Babis would represent a political setback, he will probably still get the first shot at forming the next government because his ally, President Milos Zeman, has pledged to give the mandate to the leader of the strongest individual party.
