No volunteers willing to fill vacant post of Czech president’s security chief

5 Mar, 2016 05:00

Months of advertising have failed to lure a single person into submitting their candidacy to the vacant post of the head of security of Czech President Milos Zeman to serve as the director of the police squad for Prague Castle.

For more than half a year, a vacancy for the chief of the presidential security has been left unfilled, despite two three month long advertisement for the position, police spokesman Jozef Bocana announced, Ceska televise reports.

In fact “in the previous two rounds of tenders no candidate came forward,” Bocana said voicing his surprise that not a single person has submitted their application – despite that there are hundreds of potentially qualifying candidates in various law enforcements.

Besides protecting the president, the individual serves to ensure protection of Prague Castle where Zeman’s office is situated.

Announcing yet another tender for the post, Bocana said hundreds of qualified candidates within the force have a unique opportunity to fill in the position that has remained vacant since September.

The previous head of presidential security, Petr Dongres, was fired in the fall, for failing to prevent an incident involving Ztohoven artistic group which swapped presidential flag on the castle for giant red boxer shorts.

The Ztohoven group, known for its provocative interferences in public affairs released a Facebook video post of their stunt, saying that after the swap a “proper flag of a man [Zeman] who is not ashamed of anything finally flies above Prague Castle.”

Following the incident, Zeman said that the head of the security “naturally failed”, as he pushed for the dismissal of Dongres.

The job post which hopefully will be filled by June, seeks an individual to supervise a 25 person security force. The candidate must have a college diploma, with at least 10 years of law enforcement experience, and a rank higher than a colonel.