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The 'conscience of Europe' leaves Czech presidency

Vaclav Havel, playwright and hero of the democracy movement during the communist regime in Czechoslovakia, bid farewell to public life on Sunday after 13 years as a democratic head of state.

In a special television address, the president thanked his people for their trust, saying, "Without your understanding and goodwill I would not have been able to stay in office for even a few moments."

Havel, who braved the stresses of high office despite serious health problems, stepped down as president of the Czech Republic even though a successor has not yet been found.

Speaking earlier from the same balcony of Prague Castle from which he first addressed crowds on assuming office on Dec. 29 1989, he thanked hundreds of well-wishers: "I say farewell to you after 13 years as president."

The 66 year-old dissident writer turned world statesman symbolized the victory of democracy over totalitarianism in Europe.

Havel, who spent time in communist jails as a political prisoner, became president of what was then Czechoslovakia after the "velvet revolution" that toppled the communist regime.

Three years later the country split into the Czech Republic and Slovakia, and Havel remained head of state of the now independent Czech half.

On Sunday he handed over the seals of office to Prime Minister Vladimir Spidla and Lower House Speaker Lubomir Zao-ralek, both set yesterday to share temporary presidential powers pending the election of a successor.

Parliament met in historic session last month to choose a new president but failed despite two votes on Jan. 15 and Jan. 24.

On Sunday, Spidla stressed that experts had not found anything that could cause constitutional problems during the interim period pending the appointment of a new president.

Zaoralek said the powers would be "in trust," to be handed over to a new president as quickly as possible.

Havel told television viewers the failure to find a successor was "tiresome, but it is no great disaster."

His successor would lead the country in less agitated but by no means uninteresting times, he said. "Quite the reverse: only the time which is now at hand will truly show the extent to which we are a full-fledged part of the democratic world," Havel said.

During Havel's term of office the Czech Republic joined the NATO alliance together with other former Soviet bloc states Hungary and Poland, and like them is scheduled to join the European Union in 2004.

In his television address Havel recalled the difficulties of the years of reconstruction after communism, "It is easy to destroy the fine web of civic institutions and relations that developed over the long decades, to place everything under state control and to subject the life of the entire country to a single political entity," he said.

"But it has been extremely challenging and time-consuming to put everything together again after those decades when time stood still -- just as it would certainly take a lot longer to restore a piece of antique furniture than it would to kick it to pieces."
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