Motor scootering president can risk leaving toothbrush at home

WHEN he was elected president of the former Czechoslovak Federation in 1989, Vaclav Havel wore blue jeans to work and rode a motor scooter - a gift from tennis champion Martina Navratilova - down the long halls of Hradcany Castle, the official residence and seat of government.

Four years later, when the federation split into two states, the playwright was elected president of the Czech Republic. Now 60, he is the only east European former dissident to have stayed in power continuously since the fall of communism.

Eight years in office, he has been sobered by the death of his first wife Olga and surgery for lung cancer. When he received President Jacques Chirac of France this week the short, mustachioed Mr Havel was a model of decorum.

He long ago consigned the motor scooter to the museum of presidential vehicles, but he still brings a human touch to the office after an elegant state dinner on Wednesday night, the two presidents and their wives sneaked off to Prague's old town for sausage and beer - Mr Chirac's favourite drink.

Like Mrs Robinson, Mr Havel is a figurehead with little political power. But the philosopher poet president wields great moral authority in the country of 10.3 million, where his approval ratings are 70 per cent or higher.

His admirers, like the Irish President's, say he would make an excellent UN secretary general.

Last summer, after parliamentary elections which gave no party a clear majority, he steered the country out of political crisis by arranging a compromise.

Next year Mr Havel will decide whether to seek re election for another five year term. He has joked that he would step down rather than stand against a female candidate, but Czechs believe he will see their country through the crucial coming years, when the republic will join both the EU and NATO.

Mr Havel spent an aggregate of five years in prison under communist rule, and became president of the former Czechoslovakia just six months after he got out of jail.

One of his chief "sins" was being the spokesman for Charter 77, which demanded that communist authorities grant their people political and human rights.

Mr Chirac apparently preferred Mr Havel's company to that of the Prime Minister, Mr Vaclav Klaus, the tough talking economist who has produced the Czech economic miracle. It is President Havel - not Mr Klaus - who is pushing for early admission to the EU.

Mr Havel is the man of vision, above the fray of politics Mr, Klaus must deal with the hard realities of power.

Mr Havel had forged a strong friendship with Francois Mitterrand, Mr Chirac's predecessor at the Elysee.

In December 1988 Mr Mitterrand invited a handful of dissidents to breakfast at the French embassy in Prague. "I, brought my toothbrush," Mr Havel told the stunned French president. "You never know they may arrest me on my way out."

Every Sunday Mr Havel makes a radio broadcast in which he comments on the news. The need for integrity and truth in politics is a constant theme.

When he went to hospital last December with lung cancer, the fear was palpable in Prague. Doctors removed half of his right lung, but Mr Havel made a quick recovery and on January 4th secretly married Dagmar Veskrnova, a pretty, popular blond actor 17 years younger than him.

His first wife Olga, to whom he was married for 32 years, had died of cancer a year earlier.

Some Czechs were shocked that he should remarry so quickly. Others were delighted to see the beaming and obviously happy couple together in public.