Czech Minister resigns 2 days before confidence vote.

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The Czech centre - left cabinet of billionaire Andrej Babis lost a member two days ahead of a parliamentary confidence vote after the justice minister from his own party resigned over plagiarism allegations .
Tatana Mala, 36 , told reporters she was stepping down amid “ a disgusting smear campaign ” after only 13 days in cabinet , following media allegations that she had copied parts of her two master ’ s theses from 2005 and 2011 .
“ We really need a cabinet with confidence and I don ’ t want to stand in the way , ” said Mala, who studied agricultural engineering and law .
Babis , who is himself facing police charges over EU subsidy fraud , said he would ask President Milos Zeman to temporarily put him in charge of the justice ministry .
Having failed to put together a viable cabinet after his ANO movement took last October ’ s general election by storm with an anti - corruption ticket , Babis teamed up with the leftwing Social Democrats to form a minority cabinet named by Zeman on June 27 .
The two parties have 93 seats in the 200 - member parliament and need the backing of the Communists who have 15 seats .
The Communists have vowed informal support in exchange for positions in large state - owned enterprises , gaining a role in government , albeit an informal one , for the first time since the Communist regime fell in the former Czechoslovakia in 1989 .
The cabinet also has another vacant post, at the foreign ministry , after Zeman refused to name Social Democrat Miroslav Poche , with the job temporarily taken by party chairman and Interior Minister Jan Hamacek.
The pro - Russian , pro - Chinese , anti -Muslim Zeman has slammed Poche over corruption allegations from the past and his tolerant stance on migrants .
Pundits have said the real reason was Poche ’ s support for Zeman ’ s rival in January ’ s presidential vote, in which the 73 - year - old ex - Communist narrowly won a second five- year term .
Babis ’ s first attempt to form a cabinet after the October election ended in January when his minority government of ANO members and unaffiliated experts lost a confidence vote.
Last autumn, police charged Babis — a food , chemicals and media tycoon and the second wealthiest Czech — with EU subsidy fraud to the tune of two million euros ($ 2 . 4 million ) .
The Slovak- born entrepreneur , who was a Communist Party member in the 1980 s , has also been dogged by allegations that he served as a Communist secret police agent before 1989 . Babis has denied any wrongdoing .

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