Czech President Petr Pavel on July 22 vetoed a government-backed bill aimed at loosening the state budget responsibility rules in the case of a worsening security situation.

The veto will likely be overridden by the ruling coalition led by Prime Minister Andrej Babiš. It marks another clash between the anti-populist president and the populist government headed by the billionaire PM.

“This bill enables the government to borrow significantly more than it does today. In practice this means that the government will gain greater space for financing costs through debt,” Pavel said in a statement shared by his office’s Prague Castle website.

“If the state sets up rules which enable easier cost increases through debt, the final bill for this decision will be left to all of us in the future,” Pavel added, arguing that the tabled legislation would give additional powers to the government to hike budget costs “by up to 10% based just on the decision of its own security advisory body” without legislators’ approval.

“The bill is creating a space for the Ministry of Finance to make these decisions from a significantly stronger position,” Pavel also said.

It is the first time that Pavel has vetoed a bill backed by the sitting radical populist government that came to power in December 2025. Two bills passed by the previous government, a centre-right administration led by Petr Fiala during 2021-2025, were vetoed by Pavel.

The bill was previously opposed by the Upper Chamber of the Parliament, the Senate, but the ruling coalition overrode the decision with its majority in the Lower Chamber and now expects to push ahead with the bill by overriding the presidential veto.

Petr Macinka, Minister of Foreign Affairs and leader of the anti-green and eurosceptic Motorists for Themselves party, said that “for the government this [veto] does not represent any real complication”.

“We have counted with the possibility that the president would be in opposition towards us. The government will override this presidential veto with its majority in the nearest session [in parliament]”, Macinka was quoted as saying by Czech Television (CT).

Macinka argued that Pavel’s move is supposed to be “a political position, which he plays towards the government on a long term basis”.

As IntelliNews previously reported, the Czech Constitutional Court ordered the Babiš government to include Pavel in the early July Czech delegation to Ankara for a Nato leaders' annual summit. A preliminary ruling from the court followed a lawsuit brought by former high-ranking Nato commander Pavel, filed on June 23 in response to the cabinet not including him in the delegation.

Pavel’s lawsuit against the cabinet stemmed from the latest in a series of rows between the presidency and the cabinet led by Babiš’ Ano party.

These include Pavel’s refusal to appoint controversy-mired Filip Turek of the Motorists as minister of environment and Pavel’s criticism of the government failure to meet the 2%-of-GDP Nato defence spending target this year.

Also, as IntelliNews reported in January, Pavel accused Macinka of blackmailing him after Macinka tried to pressure Pavel into changing his decision not to appoint Turek as environment minister following a scandal over racist, sexist and homophobic comments posted online by Turek.