Thursday, December 20, 2007

Interim government from its onset

Today Latvian parliament convenes in order to vote for the new government. In the Latvian public TV morning news incumbent president reiterated that he still trusts the statemanship of Ivars Godmanis. President said that he wants to have the five right wing party government in Latvia, but the New Era (JL) backed off yesterday. The JL backing off was legitimate if one remembers why did government of Aigars Kalvītis resign - total distrust of it in the eyes of public opinion, and foremost due to the open breach of law of the government from October 2006 - November 2007. Regardless of the public opinion the formation of the government was sped up with the shallow argument that the government must be formed prior Christmas.

It means that regardless of the October & November demonstrations, total dissatisfaction of the government and parliament in the eyes of the civic society(www.eurobarometer.eu)Latvian public shall probably witness the old government with new PM and couple of new faces in the same bunch of jokers.

Present governing coalition parties, that should be better called minigarchic interest groups, have totally discredited themselves. While Latvian economy has been transformed since the 1991 and there are significant changes in the society the political elite has stagnated. Next year there is a time for repeating Latvia something similar to the Korean 2000 elections when he Millenium party cleaned the political sleaze of the authoritarian regime.

The new government, which might be approved today with 52-55 votes out of 99, would not serve long. The Trade Union Confederation announced that the 10 000 signatures for the referendum to initiate dispersal of the parliament are collected and should be be handed over to the Central Electoral Bureau early next year. Preparations for the snap elections are ingeneered into the next year today by the existing parliamentary majority.

Merry Christmas! And I am leaving for Stockholm to enjoy the Holidays!!

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Enjoy Stockholm -- passport-free I guess! Oh, this Schengen expansion was too soon...

Let's hope Godmanis is still PM when you get back and that there is still a government...