Czech President Faces a Runoff After First Round of Voting<br />13, 2018<br />PRAGUE — President Milos Zeman of the Czech Republic failed to win re-election in the first round of a presidential vote on Saturday<br />and will face a runoff in two weeks against the former president of the country’s Academy of Sciences.<br />Mr. Zeman and the runner-up in the first round, Jiri Drahos, advanced to a second round of voting<br />because none of the nine candidates seeking the country’s largely ceremonial presidency received a majority of votes in the initial round, held on Friday and Saturday.<br />Mr. Zeman, 73, a former prime minister, was elected in 2013 during the country’s first direct presidential vote.<br />Drahos said that he would like to meet me face to face," the president said.<br />With almost all the ballots counted by the Czech Statistics Office, Mr. Zeman had 38.6 percent of the vote compared with 26.6 for Mr. Drahos.<br />Mr. Zeman congratulated Mr. Drahos and said he was ready to debate him before the runoff vote, which begins on Jan. 26.
