Babis

The Slovak-born Babis is well aware that a delivery of Sputnik V just helped depose the prime minister of his mother country, but he's also eyeing his rapidly dwindling popularity ahead of the Czech elections in October and the likelihood that he'll have to rely on Zeman's Machiavellian manoeuvres if he wants to head the next government.

Prime Minister of the Czech Republic, Andrej Babi, arrived today to an official visit to Serbia, during which he met with the state leadership of our country.
At Belgrade's "Nikola Tesla" airport, Babis was welcomed by Serbian Foreign Minister Nikola Selakovic.
The President of Serbia posted a joint photo with Babi and Ana Brnabi on his Instagram account.

That said, there's plenty of time for spin, scandal and scheming to change the course. "It will be interesting to see how Ano's marketers will camouflage Babis's failures in leadership," Otto Eibl, an assistant professor in political science at Masaryk University, told BIRN.

According to David Ondracka, TI's high-profile director in the Czech Republic, alleged slurs by Babis are all part of an attempt to "delegitimise the messenger" by labelling his NGO "corrupt".

"Imagine me being Harry Potter, having a magic stick and transforming all the planned projects into reality now," he continued. "We would immediately become a second Switzerland."

Of course, Babis was quickly reminded that despite his immense economic and political heft, his powers remain earthbound.