Havel Loses Czechoslovak Presidency : Politics: Disgruntled Slovaks prevent reelection of the leader of 1989’s democratic revolution.

Vaclav Havel, the dissident philosopher-playwright turned president, was voted out of office Friday, a victim of post-Communist Czechoslovakia’s political and nationalistic fragmentation.

Havel, 55, gained worldwide stature as Czechoslovakia’s head of state after leading the revolution against the Communists in 1989, arguing for reconciliation and avoidance of witch hunts against the country’s former totalitarian rulers.

But his humanistic approach, much applauded by the outside world, could not stem the nationalistic impulses launched by politicians in Slovakia, whose vote Friday in the federal Parliament in Prague brought his presidency to an end.

Parliament elected no successor immediately, and another round of voting with new candidates is slated for July 16. If the deadlock persists, Havel will remain in office until the expiration of his term Oct. 5, at which point the federal government, sharply trimmed in preparation for what could be the breakup of the country, will assume his executive powers.

According to the Parliament’s complex voting system, a vote for president is taken simultaneously in the 150-seat upper House of the People and in each of the two 75-seat regional chambers of the House of the Nations.

Havel won only 22 votes in the Slovak chamber of the lower House of the Nations.

In the second round, he needed at least 38 votes in that chamber but received only 18.

His reelection in the voting, both rounds by secret ballot, apparently was blocked by deputies from Vladimir Meciar’s Movement for Democratic Slovakia, the strongest political force in the eastern republic.

Havel became the country’s first post-Communist, democratically elected president Dec. 29, 1989. He was reelected June 5, 1990.

Meciar, a former boxer and Communist Party official, made it clear after elections last month that his party would oppose Havel’s presidency. Havel’s political allies perhaps had sealed the outcome of Friday’s vote by a move last year that resulted in Meciar’s being ousted as Slovakia’s prime minister. Meciar took it as a further insult when, in the election campaign, Havel warned voters against politicians who “seek to incite” and “work only for themselves.”

Meciar, as the head of the leading Slovak party, has been deadlocked in negotiations with conservative politician Vaclav Klaus, who led the voting in the Czech republic. On June 20, the two agreed to split the 74-year-old federation in two, giving the federal Parliament the mandate to work out the details of the separation by Sept. 30.

Klaus, who has been federal finance minister for the past three years, has been the driving force behind a series of market-oriented economic reforms that have hit Slovaks more severely than the more affluent Czechs.

From the beginning of his negotiations with Meciar, he has insisted on a tight federation with a unified fiscal policy.

Meciar began by seeking a looser arrangement that would give Slovakia more control of its economy, a relationship that seemed to fall somewhere between “autonomy” and a confederation of two independent states. He also insisted on separate membership in international organizations and a series of other demands that Klaus refused to accept.

Havel argued long and hard against the breakup and, in several appearances in Slovakia in the last year, found himself shouted down by hecklers, his car spat upon as he departed.

He also argued strongly for a referendum on the separatist issue, which Meciar and other Slovak politicians rejected, realizing that their political muscle would wither immediately with the result: Public opinion polls taken before the election showed that the 5.5 million Slovaks were against separation by margins of up to 80%.

Some Slovak politicians have also argued recently that Meciar’s HZDS party, winning about 35% of the vote, has no mandate to split the federation.

Klaus, meanwhile, has played hardball with the Slovaks, refusing to give in to their demands and winning broad support among the Czech public for his tough stand.

Despite the humiliation of the parliamentary vote Friday, it is not likely that Havel will vanish from the scene.

Klaus, who would be prime minister in the new, separate Czech lands, has indicated that when a new constitution is written, a provision will be included for the office of president.

Most likely, that office would be ticketed for Havel, whose popularity in the Czech republic is overwhelmingly high.

Havel said recently, “The way I know myself, you will not get me out of politics easily, and I will not desert my people.”

Havel was not present in the Federal Assembly for the two votes.

After the last-minute withdrawal of the only other candidate, Juraj Cop, deputy chairman of the extreme rightist Republican Party, Havel went into the votes unopposed--lending a farcical touch to the proceedings that would have appealed to Havel, who made his reputation as a playwright of the absurd.

Profile: Vaclav Havel

Born: Oct. 5, 1936

Hometown: Prague

Education: Academy of Arts in Prague

Emergence as a dissident: He spent five years in jail for his views. His plays championing individual liberty were banned for 20 years.

Term as president: Elected on Dec. 29, 1989; reelected on June 5, 1990. His term won him vast domestic and international prestige, but the frustrations of open democracy produced the seeds of his rejection.