Von der Leyen arrived in Prague to support her campaign for the European Parliament

The President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, arrived on Tuesday morning for a several-hour visit to Prague. She met with representatives of companies from the defense industry, according to the information provided by KDU-ČSL MEP Tomáš Zdechovský and party spokesman Simon Dytrych. Von der Leyenová will also meet some politicians, especially from TOP 09 and from the KDU-ČSL, and later in the afternoon she will be received by President Petr Pavel and Prime Minister Petr Fiala (ODS).

The one-day visit to Prague is related to the election campaign of the European People’s Party, for which von der Leyen wants to defend her mandate at the head of the EU executive. At the beginning of March, the President of the Commission received the official nomination of the European People’s Party (EPP) to run for a second mandate. The German politician was supported by 400 delegates of the European People’s Party at the party congress in Romania, while 89 were against. The EPP is currently the largest political group in the European Parliament. Among the Czech political entities, its members are KDU-ČSL and TOP 09 and the STAN movement.

In the pre-election polls, the EPP is clearly in the lead and the candidate from the faction that gets the most votes in the elections is usually nominated for the position of head of the European Commission. According to experts, there is a good chance that von der Leyen will be able to stay in office.