The 2015 migrant crisis that swept Europe, but not the Czech Republic, will be “a very important topic, even the crucial one” of the final phase of the campaign, said independent analyst Jiří Pehe.
“We may expect a series of attacks and counter-attacks” centred on migration.
Echoing popular opinion, President Miloš Zeman is stridently anti-Muslim, having once called the migrant crisis “an organized invasion” of Europe and insisted Muslims were “impossible to integrate”.
He ruled out Prague accepting migrants, fearing they might form “a hotbed for terror attacks” in Europe.
“When Miloš Zeman wants to mobilize his supporters, he presents himself as a defender of the country, as if he were ready to protect the border with a gun in his hand,” said Pehe.
In contrast, his rival Jiří Drahoš, the former head of the Czech Academy of Sciences (CAS), has spoken up against “fear, hysterics and intolerance sparked by populists and extremists”.
But with public opinion set firmly against migrants, the EU-friendly Drahoš also opposes the bloc’s migrant quotas, telling the latest edition of the Týden weekly: “I reject quotas, they haven’t worked from the beginning.”
However, unlike Zeman, Drahoš leaves the door open to accepting some migrants but insists that “we must decide who can get asylum in the Czech Republic and nobody can dictate who we must accept.”
A recent poll by the CAS has shown that 81% of Czechs oppose accepting Muslim migrants.
The EU and NATO country of 10.6 million people has received only 12 migrants under the bloc’s quota system, prompting Brussels to take Prague to court in December along with Budapest and Warsaw. They could all be slapped with heavy fines.
Even families are split on the migrant issue.
“I like Zeman’s firmness on this. I want my country to stay safe. I’m afraid Drahoš will obey everything that Brussels orders,” says Martina Hořánková from the northwestern city of Ústí nad Labem.
“Drahoš will be able to distinguish between refugees and those bogus economic migrants,” replies her husband Stanislav Hořánek.
Drahoš was previously less strident in his rejection of the quota system, saying in June 2017 that “accepting some 2,600 refugees or migrants should not pose any problems if they undergo a security check.”
Ahead of the run-off, Zeman is playing the migration card for all it is worth, insisting that “it is logical and justified to draw links between Mr Drahoš and migration.”
“Stop immigrants and Drahoš. This country is ours! Vote Zeman!” reads an ad published in newspapers and on billboards across the country and financed by a mysterious group called “Miloš Zeman’s Friends”.
“The campaign has been fair up to now. But this is filthy,” said Marek Hilšer, who finished fifth out of nine candidates in the first round of the presidential vote on January 12-13.
Many Zeman supporters see Drahoš as a welcomer of migrants.
They blame him for having signed the “Scientists’ Appeal against Fear and Indifference” in August 2015, which they perceive as an appeal to accept migrants.
But Drahoš argues that there is “not a single word about accepting migrants” in the text.
“Drahoš will probably find himself under pressure over migrants,” Pehe told AFP but points out that he can strike back by questioning “the origin of the money used to finance the anti-Drahoš ads in the papers (that) is not entirely clear.”
Zeman, an ex-communist known for his pro-Russian and pro-Chinese stance, won the first round of the presidential vote with 38.56% support, ahead of Drahoš with 26.6%.
Polls show Drahoš can count on the support of most of the other seven candidates who dropped out in round one, which would put him ahead of the incumbent.