Parliamentary elections in Latvia - democracy won!

There is still about an hour till closing the election stations, but one is clear already - such a surge of electoral activity Latvia has not witnessed since 2002! In the 2002 parliamentary elections total of 72.5% voters participated, while during last parliamentary elections this number dropped to the scanty 61.5%. Representative democracy without voters controlling their representatives can turn out to be a fiction and between 1993-2010 the Latvian representative democracy was neither representative nor democratic. The ill famous "locomotive principle", which was finally evicted from the election law in 2009, allowed to manipulate election results and thus to ossify Latvian political culture. The fact that the locomotive principle was erased from the law is not a panacea and improvement of the political culture I envisage only for the 2014 parliamentary elections, because for the future parliament and government there are number of titanic economic tasks ahead of them.

The number of voters in Latvia at 16.00 stood at 45.6% today and this number is already greater than it was during 2006 elections. Also all electoral station around the world report unusually high electoral activity that could increase the total activity by a solid percentage point. My conservative predictions for the electoral participation stand at 67% and information from Riga electoral districts confirm that folks are standing in queues, which could shot the participation rate also over 70%.

This fact is the best news tonight and allow me to gladly announce that democracy is lively in Latvia! Possibly good election result would only confirm Latvian voters that their vote counts, and that is not a small thing! Possibly good result of these elections could sideline traditional Latvian oligarchic parties from power and I would not be surprised if partisan electors themselves would sideline such oligarchs as Andris Šķēle from power. Preliminary results could deliver devastating results for the former president Guntis Rumpītis-Ulmanis who foolishly believed in his vainglory. But lets leave predictions aside now, because even more intriguing would be to follow the future who is who's of the Latvian parliament.

The exit poll results would be revealed in 10 minutes and therefore I better finish now, because the most important fact has taken place already - the voters believed in their own sound judgement and they cast their vote in order to participate in making Latvia's and their own future for the next four years! Long live democracy!!!