BALTIC

Mandatory tax and property declaration (Updated)

2011-12-01T13:36:00.000-08:00

FINALLY after two decades of ongoing debates and painstaking foot dragging the Latvian parliamentary majority has managed to pass thus significant law on mandatory tax and property declaration by unanimous vote! It happened exactly eighteen and seventeen years later than in Estonia and Lithuania. I will elaborate in detail on this important legal innovation during upcoming weekend, but until then Latvian Internal Revenue Service can finally start preparing to operate in an environment when they have a legal basis for prosecuting oligarchic or minigarchic crooks in earnest:)

P.S. Here is the latest Latvijas Fakti pollster about the popularity of the Latvian political parties

Updated

Gatis Šļūka

(Lady) "We are absolutely zeroes (nerds)...
(Man) "No. We do not have to submit the zero declaration (mandatory tax and property declaration).

Emergency elections over and referendum forthcoming (updated)

2011-11-30T03:33:00.000-08:00

September 17, 2011 emergency elections are behind us and after rather eventful government formation process the new cabinet has managed to accomplish already quite some significant feats. Evaluation of the government work traditionally takes place after the first hundred days, thus proper assessment of the work of the government will come from the author of this blog during the first half of the February. Until then we will have to live through the metamorphosis of the Latvian political system due to the possible referendum (due to the signature collection campaign about the Russian as the second language in Latvia), because the Central Electoral Commission must announce their initial verdict during upcoming days. The effective travails of the government and the parliament will determine whether the structure of the outdated infrastructure of public services will be finally transformed. If it will give at least some tangible results then the newly opened disagreements on language policy would be probably mitigated.

Actually the outcome of signature collection campaign signifies that the 2013 March municipal elections campaign has virtually started. The political environment was unnecessarily shaken up and channeled into the national antagonism again. There were several factors at play, and one cannot deny that among major culprits for such a turn of events were actions of the National Alliance rushly initiating signature campaign during the Summer 2011, and which proposed overhauling the present policy of language instruction, and the Zatlers Reform Party puzzling behavior during the government formation process. It is essential now for the Valdis Dombrovskis government to focus on public policy issues and untangling the obscure Krājbanka ( Savings Bank), RVR, ABC & Antonov affair. The successful result of untangling this odious affair as well as embedding the rule of law and appointing the new head of the FKTK in the parliament will foster gradual recovery of trust in banks and also the democratic institutions among the Latvian public. Why do I sound thus optimistic during the times when the Eurozone is balancing on the verge of the brake-up, and there are many rogue regimes flexing their military muscles around the globe? Because I believe in rationality in of Europeans to solve their crisis, I believe that defense capabilities of the NATO provides enough deterrent to make the NATO and EU citizens to feel safe, and last but not least the Latvian citizenry are inherently willing to build their families in peaceful and happy atmosphere. Therefore, whilst following the precepts of Almond & Verba during the 1960-70's I believe that also Latvian politicians should spend more time on policy rather than polity issues, because too much tinkering about the democratic framework issues could create quite a political fallout...

Mme Latvia [handing over SACKING OF THE PARLIAMENT medicine]: "Those drugs you prescribed me doctor do not help because what I am feeling is, that I could even loose my [native] tongue"
The Doctor: "But we cured oligarch illness after all, madam!"

Gatis Šļūka

UPDATED

This morning IR announced that more than 170 000 signatures have been collected by the NGO "Native tongue" in order to proceed with the constitutional amendments and introduce the Russian as the second state language in Latvia. The signature collection campaign was supported by prominent opposition politicians, including the major of Riga, and it has reopened the animosity between the Latvian and Russophone speakers again.

For opposition populist politicians to galvanize their policies on language issue could be problematic, because legally to succeed in their efforts they have quite high hurdles established by the constitutional fathers of Latvia. After the Electoral Commission will announce official results of the signature collection campaign the constitutional amendments bill must go into the parliament, and knowing the balance between government and opposition forces the bill would definitely not pass over the 2/3 threshold. The Satversme (constitution) Art. 77 says that if articles 1, 2, 3, 4, 6, and 77 are proposed to be amended, then in order to take legal effect, any of them must be affirmed by a referendum. Because now the state language is Latvian (Art. 4), it means that such constitutional amendments could be adopted only, if at least one-half of those who have the right to vote have declared themselves in their favour (Art. 79). Today there are about 1,5 million eligible voters in Latvia, thus for the signature campaign organizers the task to overcome the 700-750 000 hurdle is simply insurmountable.

This makes me to conclude that the whole signature campaign and democratic activism of the opposition politicians was to went their frustration over the emergency elections results. The rush referendum of the National Alliance during the 2011 summer played its role and there have been several authors pointing to this fact, which triggered activism of the second signature campaign. It was not the only reason, however, because the Russian language issues are lately rather symptomatically popping up in the territory of the former USSR in concerted manner. Nevertheless, as I already stated the equivocal role of the ZRP party together with the ambivalent statements of the National Alliance party did not help to calm the situation down but quite the opposite.

After all I believe that the last signature collection campaign galvanized not only Russophone, but also Latvian speakers, and the referendum result shall deliver a clear cut result leaving the Article 4 unamended. And to conclude on this positive note I must quote Dmitry from today's Diena, who took the crux of the just finished signature collection campaign into the nutshell: "To tell you honestly I am against the second state language [Russian in Latvia], but I gave my signature against the initiatives of the National Alliance this summer, which would have forced all schools to instruct only in Latvian. In the forthcoming referendum he would not participate, because if he really thinks what matters, then there does not exist language problem in Latvia."

Only tanks could help us to get out from this swamp...(Doctor Valdis Zatlers)

2011-10-08T06:50:00.000-07:00

Source: IR

Lack of consistent policies after September 17 elections

2011-10-06T00:57:00.000-07:00

After the September 17 snap elections the electorate is literally boiling in Latvia. The major reason for Valdis Zatlers to sack the parliament and to form his own party was the questıon of rule of law and elimination of LV oligarchy (particularly pay attention to the second & third paragraph!). Ever since the perplexing announcement last Friday night the Latvian electorate has been split in two. The reason for the split of the public opinion is not only the outdated perception of the Latvian electorate to see the politics to be divided between ethnically defined parties (which was catered by the political parties in power for the last 20 years), but also the sudden change of the list of major tasks right after the elections.

Change of the discourse after elections happens to minimum degree in many consolidated democracies. In case of Valdis Zatlers the discourse turnaround has been complete, because he pronounced the reforms of the outdated higher education system, tax code and governance modes as well as the fight against the oligarchs even on the election billboards ( see below). Since last Saturday it is barely possible to hear about reforms and ending of the IMF&EU financial aid mission or the 2012 budget, because Valdis Zatlers change of tack has enabled him to court openly with the representatives of the same party he was supposedly to stand against. It has disoriented groups of voters, and the result of such disorientation is clear, because less than month after elections 1/3 of those questioned would not vote for the party they voted barely three weeks ago, again... .

It is certain coul de sac situation now and lets hope that Valdis Dombrovksis could help the former president out from the corner he has painted himself, and return either to the status quo ante, or move into the direction of all inclusive rainbow coalition government:) It was just announced that the rainbow coalition talks have failed, thus there should be return to status quo ante... Bringing in the Harmony Center party into coalition negotiations is welcome only after ZRP and Unity have agreed on reform package and formed the nucleus of the governing coalition. After solving disagreements about certain misunderstandings in the package deal it is possible to move on with the third partner. The president has announced the deadline, and lets hope that the common sense will win and lead the Latvian electorate out of these dire straits! Hopefully the ZRP and Unity would move on and find the most qualified third partner to finish thus needed political and economic reforms before the looming world economic crisis hits hard in early 2012.

WHO WILL WIN IN THE 11TH SAEIMA ELECTIONS?

AGAINST THE OLIGARCHS:

FOR CLEAN POLITICS FREE FROM PRESSURE GROUPS

TOGETHER WITH OLIGARCHS:

51 VOTE TOGETHER WITH UNION OF GREENS AND FARMERS AND FOR GOOD LATVIA IN 10TH SAEIMA (But with the Janis Urbanovitch (Harmony Center) on the background of the billboard)

Volatility of the Latvian political system (UPDATED)

2011-09-23T01:57:00.000-07:00

2011 snap elections are over and my first try to get elected into the parliament was not successful. The coalition negotiations are ongoing and tough and I will elaborate on the results of previously mentioned processes more in my next blog entries. This time I am republishing a chart which clearly outlines volatility of the Latvian party political system, because every elections since regaining the independence in 1991 undecided swing voters have been migrating to the new party:)

Source: Dienas Bizness

P.S. Here are my first and second takes about LV politics in Estonian.
P.P.S. And here is my week old piece for Maaleht (in Estonian)

UPDATED

Here is the composition of the 11th Saeima before the new cabinet is in place, which means that 13 ministers most probably would be replaced with the MP's with a soft mandate.

Would they understand it? (UPDATED)

2011-09-01T21:41:00.001-07:00

Emergency elections are approaching and my campaign intensity is increasing. The last two weeks will be hopefully less hectic due to the planned strategy of pinpointing the electioneering areas. After 17.09.2011 coalition government will be formed, and I am wondering whether average Latvian voters have comprehended consequences of the possible union between the Harmony Center and UGF party and stalling of economic reforms?

Source: IR

UPDATED

Wikileaks has provided very interesting leaks about events worldwide and Latvia has not been an exception. Those who want to understand how the Parex affair was built read this. And thanks to Nellija Ločmele there is ample of information about the formative events in Latvia from 2007 - 2009 here and here.

Pollsters prior 17.09.2011

2011-08-22T19:59:00.000-07:00

Here you have "Latvijas fakti" pollster showing the latest trends. Pollsters are tricky business, because different polling firms in Latvia do show different results. I have sticked to "Latvijas Fakti" and SKDS, because they are traditional and they do show certain trends. The most obvious one is the number of undecided or swing voters and as you can see the number has declined from 35% down to 31.3%. However, there is still some way to go and the most successful of the contenders will get the biggest chunk of those 20.7% voters who simply do not know whom they are going to vote for. Also, except the insignificant pocket parties four of the most realistic contenders for getting into the Saeima - Unity, Harmony Center, Union of Greens and Farmers, and National Alliance - are showing the trend of growth. The Zatlers Reform Party support has slightly declined due to the questionable emulation of the tradition of showing who the prime ministerial candidate will be. Lets see the polls next week to grasp the dynamics of election campaign in the simultaneously transforming Latvian party political system.

In order to make predicitions you need a solid base...

2011-08-18T01:16:00.000-07:00

Any science needs measurable quantities or substances in order to get thruthful answers. It is even more true in social sciences and the balanced development of the Western societies has given political scientists ample of time to make certain and solid predictions after the Wortld War II. Conclusions of Ron Ingelhardt, Gabriel Almon or Giovanni Sartori still hold very much to the stability of Western societies, which are gradually changing if we folow what is happening in Belgium, the US, PIGS or Mexico today. Party political systems are changing in all previously mentioned countries except the US due to the FPTP electoral system, but it explains the polarization of opinions prior last four US presidential elections, TEA party phenomenon, and many other new developments in once ''stable'' party political wheeling & dealing systems. Thus, the once easily predictable voter's behaviour is transforming and particularly in peripheral EU countries the party system volatility is increasing.

Latvia, is no exception here and the volatility of the Latvian parties is closer to the homologues in Central or South America, rather than ones in the Central Europe. The endemic corruption and state capture was practiced all those years due to the cleptocratic elites and meek populations, who were not demanding their representatives to be legitimate within the system of rule of law. Thus, the Latvian existing miniscule political parties are being remade now or there are new ones created, when finally very essential legal amendments are on the threshold (the mandatory tax and property declarations system should be introduced by January 1,2012 and ppolitical parties will be funded from the state budget as of the same date).

For the September 17, 2012 elections there will be thirteen party lists competing for the 100 seat parliament. The competition might seem fierce but in reality there are only five considerable contenders for passing the 5% entry threshold - the center right Unity, the center left Harmony Center, liberal Zatlers Reform party, the conservative National Alliance and Union of Greens and Farmers. While the center, right, left or liberal appears in the party programs Latvian parties it is still premature to call them this way, because the Latvian party political system is being remodeled at this very moment. Thus, ideologicaly based discourse is still to develop in Saeima, and for that the incumbent political forces ned legitimacy.

But the legitimacy is the crucial problem because so fgar unaccountability rules and previous oligarchic political parties disoriented voters. That explains why Latvia is so full of contrasts. While the Latvian Saeima was about to be be given way to continue its half baked reforms, the Latvian president literally interrupted the pregnancy just nine month after the 10'th Saeima was sworn in, and about 45% of Latvian voters in referendum decided to abort the stillborn parliament. Now, in the latest pollster one third of populations still proclaims that they do not know whom to vote for in forthcoming elections, and I can understand that. But then today there is a pollster where 77% of questioned believe that qualitative changes in the newly elected Saeima are impossible to expect. Also whilst following the latest Eurobarometer pollster, it becomes clear that Latvian voters do not see the light at the end of the tunnel as their Estonian neighbors for example. To put such a grim Latvian picture in a nutshell, what do you do in such a situation when people do not believe in ability to change smth. in their own environment? My short answer is - empower and educate them! For the more elaborate program and policies there will be a whole month to explain:)

After the Latvian July 23 referendum...

2011-08-17T03:36:00.000-07:00

The formative referendum dismissed the 10th Saeima, and the first ever emergency elections in Latvia will be held in September 17, 2011.

The time to prepare for elections is short and thus most political parties go with their old or slightly upgraded programs. Because among the Latvian populace most of the democratic institutions are dismissingly unpopular, and parliament being among them, thus many new faces have appeared on the party lists. And to make the situation even more intriguing also there is a new kid on the block, who shall try to squeeze into the Latvian party political spectrum.

Until now it is hard to predict the exact outcome of the Latvian elections, because the Latvian party political system has returned to the square one, and since the budgetary funding for the political parties will start only from 01.01.2012, we could finally start to project operations and what kind of system will be formed out from the ethnically divided and scarsely populated Latvian parties.

Because of the emergency character of those formative elections I have decided to run for the Saeima myself. This would make me to change my usual schedule and I have already started to participate in the month long election campaign sprint.

Other than that, my hunch is that the center right Unity, the center left Harmony Center (HC), the liberal Zatlers Reform (ZRP) party, the Union of Greens and Farmers as well as the conservative National Union party would get elected into the parliament. I am not sure about chances of the For Human Rights in United Latvia party as well as about the desperate maverick trying to do anything to get elected. Nevertheless, the fact is that until now about a third of electors are undecided and thus the campaign month (or better say the sprint!) will determine whether Latvian voters shall opt for the European of post-Soviet path of development. The European path would be defined by voters trusting the results of hard won reforms of the Valdis Dombrovskis government and allowing to form coalition with either the ZRP or the HC party. The opposite and hopefully non materializing path would foresee the populist politicans engineering an ethnically deterministic vote for the benefit of ''populous anarchy a'la lettica'', and thus opening Ms Latvia for uncharted waters...again:)

P.S. My latest piece in Ukrainian ''Tyzhden'' (in Ukrainian)

Formative referendum on July 23, 2011 (updated)

2011-07-22T00:57:00.000-07:00

My usual weekend calm was interrupted by the Norwegian tragedy and flying down South to the shores of Bosphorus. Since my arrival to Turkey the Latvian Central Election commission has already sealed the official results and announced that the emergency elections would take place in September 17, 2011.

The July 23, 2011 referendum in Latvia finished the procedure of dissolution of the parliament started by the former president Valdis Zatlers with his ominous May 28 Decree No. 2. The legal pretext for dissolution of the parliament served the decision of HC party together with oligarchic Union of Greens and Farmers not to lift parliamentary immunity of an another oligarch and MP Ainars Slesers when the Corruption Prevention Bureau asked with the Riga District Court permission to search premises of ominous politician. Reasons for sacking the parliament since Latvia joined the EU have been ample however. Cynical misuse of power reached the equinox, however, in the October 2006 parliamentary elections. Those elections were plagued by misuse of illegal financing and the Supreme Court of Latvia in its November 3, 2006 verdict was slightly shy from proclaiming the 2006 elections null and void. Thus, the heavy weight of oligarchic parties misusing funds and poisoning the Latvian political culture fostered the embedded culture of alienation which has estranged Latvian voters from democratic institutions of governance. Thus, the July 23, 2011 referendum results with 44% of eligible voter’s participation rate and 95% agreeing to dissolve the parliament was not unexpected.
The sheer number who voted YEA was surprising, however, because 65% of them voted for the incumbent parliament less than a year ago in parliamentary elections. Latvian political commentators have been analyzing reasons behind such distrust of citizen’s vis-à-vis their own republic, and also why the smallest number of participants in plebiscitary voting came from Riga and Latgale electoral districts. The reasons for distrust lead us back to the early 1990’s when Latvia together with other Baltic republics regained its independence. Estonia and Lithuania had a new constitutional caucus, election law and subsequent upgrading of laws concerning public finance and governance issues. Latvian legislators rolled over the constitution of 1922 and has remained the only EU member state which neither has the mandatory tax and property declarations system nor it funds political parties with Malta from the state budget. Reasons for voters in Riga and Latgale being relatively inactive (38 and 34 % participation respectively) are twofold. First, the stagnated political culture has been embedded due to the existing oligarchic parties which have openly discouraged active civic participation during referendums last five years. Second, the majority of Riga and Latgale electoral district voters voted for the mainly russophone Harmony Center (HC) party. The latter governs Riga and most of Latgale municipalities but during the last twenty years they have metamorphosed from ethnic into social democratic party and have sat in opposition all those years.
The referendum set a unique precedent while empowering the somewhat dormant Latvian civil society. The amendment in the election law stipulates that political parties will be funded from the state budget as of January 1, 2012, and many other legal innovations since the May 28, 2011 presidential decree No. 2 have strengthened the rule of law in Latvia. The only concern is the fact that in terms of party political development Latvia has returned to square one or at the point where it started in the early 1990’s. The Latvian party political system was poisoned by the ethnically determined division in right wing Latvian and left wing Russian speaking political parties. Since last elections the trend is for parties to determine its policies on social and economic issues. Thus, while the consolidation of political parties took place the political unions were not so much based on pragmatic ideologically similar platform. Thus, we may witness the plethora of new political parties being formed and some older political parties trying to merge now on the identical ideological foundations.
Such process is welcome but just two months prior emergency elections it is hard to predict how qualitative the newly formed parties will be and how well they will be able to expose the ‘’hoppers’’ from the formerly oligarchic parties. Thus, former president Zatlers Reform Party has announced itself as liberal force and thus will have to compete with catch all mechanisms for the same voter as the Unity political bloc which should merge its three constitutive parts into the right to the center political party on August 6. It is positive that there are now distinct liberal, conservative and centrist parties, but what Latvian body politics is really missing is the social democratic or progressive political force. Thus, this open niche is filled by the HC party which uses populist slogans but has not established efficient relations with the trade unions.
Therefore, while stable and leading position of HC in polls continues probably the 35-40% of undecided or swing voters will determine the election outcome. Also, I must remind here that HC party has been leadind the polls both BY Latvıjas Fakti and SKDS firms for the last three years, but they became second during last year's parliamentary elections. The latest polls showed significant decrease of support from the HS, Unity, Nationalist Bloc and Union of Greens and Farmers. The Zatlers Reform Party (ZRP) has very good starting positions but the hard labor of creating party base and little monies for the campaign will probably determine their abılıties to hold a successful campaign.

IR

Initially the ethnically defined National bloc and HC are gaining strength from the dissolution of the parliament. Successful outcome of September 17 elections will be determined by the ability of the successful political parties to create jobs, decrease unemployment and embed the rule of law however. Neither of ethnically defined parties have been able to seriously compete on those issues so far. Therefore, the major contenders for the formation of government coalition will be the governing Unity, ZRP and HC parties, while National Bloc, Union of Greens and Farmers and maybe First and Latvian Way party union would have to compete among themselves for passing the required 5% threshold for entering into the parliament.

p.s. My previous statements from the interview in ERR were actually uttered while thinking that ceteris paribus nothing will change prior elections, but since May 28, 2011 Latvia has become ''richer'' with 3 new parties, and 2 former electoral unions merging into 2 distinct parties

p.p.s. Here are my latest articles for those reading in Latvian, and Ukrainian

Basketball and elections in the Baltics 2011

2011-06-19T14:23:00.000-07:00

Even though Latvia prepares for the hot electioneering after the July 23 referendum about the dispersal of the Saeima there is ordinary life still going on. In addition there are also elections in Estonia this summer, when the new president should be elected in the Riigikogu. The decision of Indrek Tarand (MEP) to become a contender along Toomas Hendrik Ilves in August 27, 2011 presidential elections has added spice to the usually calm Estonian political climate. While the Estonian politicians debate the historic legacy of the incumbent president one may predict that probably some of the discussions would focus on pros and cons of the popularly elected vs. parliamentary elected head of state problematique.

Latvian incumbent president Valdis Zatlers would probably try to continue overhauling the Latvian oligarchy. After his ominous Decree No. 2 in May 28. 2011 there are some very significant changes taking place in the Latvian parliament already. After wrangling for two years the head of the KNAB was finally popped with 82 YEA votes and only two MP's abstained. Also the parliament in its last session prior the summer recess lowered the limits for the election campaign financing by half, opened the way for MP's to be prosecuted if the Prosecutors office or Supreme Court decides so. The amendments in the Commercial Act would finally allow judicial branch to learn the beneficiaries of the offshore companies in Latvia. And last but not least the the head of the Constitutional Court officially announced that the ill qualified member of the Constitutional Court Vineta Muižniece probably has no way of return to work at the Supreme Court. The previously mentioned member of the court was suspended from her duties, because she is facing criminal proceedings for fraud while being the head of the Legal Committee of the Parliament.

Political process is slowly euroepanized in Latvia but parliamentary elections would probably bring only scanty changes. If one thinks about the long term sustainability of the Latvian democracy then the public initiatives, which started after famous "funerals of oligarchs", could probably ensure embededness of civic participation in Latvia. Estonia would further develop en route of becoming another boring Nordic state, and the summer would be spent in vacationing mood. It would actually be a perfect moment for many tourists who would be coming to Lithuania for the Eurobasket 2011, or allowing the basketball to be played in country where the game could be equated with religion. Also many Latvian fans are grateful to the Eurobasket 2011 organizers, because the Latvian men's squad would be playing its preliminary round in Siauliai, the town situated almost on the Latvian border.

While there is dim hope for Latvian men's team reaching beyond the preliminary stage there is little doubt that Mr Kemzura's squad would be willing to show the best Lithuanian krepsinis has to offer. In the meantime Latvian fans are following with keen interest another Eurobasket. While Lithuanian fans can cheer on about a very good performance of their ladies squad Latvian team made headlines only tonight. L'Equipe header tonight: "retour sur terre!" explains it all, because Latvian women's squad managed to work hard and deservedly won the reigning European champions. The midsummer night and biggest festivities of the year are approaching, and on June 23-24 the cities will empty in Latvia and Estonia. In the meantime while Lithuanian ladies will have to play themselves out from the media clout of their male colleagues, it is the Latvian male basketball players who have to find ways around the better playing female colleagues. Enjoy the basketball and smile about the politics in the Baltic States this summer!

Photo: www.fibaeurope.com

After the 2011 Latvian presidential elections

2011-06-05T10:20:00.000-07:00

Even though he is not a party member, he was elected on the Union of Farmers and Greens party list into the parliament and on June 2, 2011 Andris Bērziņš became the 7th democratically elected president of Latvia. More thorough analysis would follow in couple of days, but the overall mood in Latvia those days could not be better depicted by Gatis Šļūka.

[Oh my god! I have lost my way...]

June 2, 2011 presidential elections in the Latvian parliament

2011-06-01T21:01:00.000-07:00

Its about couple of hours until the presidential elections in the Latvian parliament will start. Latvia is a classical parliamentary republic with 100 representatives electing the president once in four years. Today its time for reelecting the incumbent candidate, or choosing a new one after the last Saturday' s announcement which caused only small tremors until now, but hopefully would overhaul the whole Latvian governing edifice. Delfi has published historic review of how the presidential elections were taking place for the last twenty years. I very much hope that today's decision would be the last one with MP's politicking...:)

There is an ooutright war announced against self made minigarhic politicians and the Corruption Prevention Bureau is doing its job while the head of the bureau was on the leave, thus its time to pop this nuisance as well.

The optimal result of today's elections should help Latvia proceed with its structural reforms in economic and political system. While at the end of the year the IMF financial assistance should be terminated, Latvia could have a steely president, public cleaned of corrupt politicians and public officials, new parliament elected - a true RESET of democratic rule! Thus, the Latvian people could have a fresh start - and this is what I wish prior the outcome of today's vote in the parliament:)

p.s. Here are pieces 1, 2, 3, 4 for the Estonian readers

Politiskās partijas, vides stabilizācija un nākotnes skices (atbilde Alehinam)

2011-04-24T22:09:00.000-07:00

Esmu pieķēries emuāra ierakstam uz kuru pamudināja mans vēstuļu draugs. Disertācija un darba pienākumi nav ļāvuši laiku veltīt emuāru pierakstiem, lai arī dažkārt radās sajūta, ka varbūt vajadzēja vairāk pievērsties rakstībai brīvā formā. Tomēr laiks ir ierobežots, un tāpēc ar šo ierakstu centīšos ne tikai izvērst aprakstu par virsrakstā norādīto tēmu, bet arī iespēju robežās centīšos atbildēt uz Alehina uzdotajiem jautājumiem.

Latvijas politisko partiju jeb interešu grupu attīstība 2007-2009 satricinājumu rezultātā ir tēlaini izsakoties nonākusi atpakaļ 1991.g. sākumpunktā. Rietumu tradīcijas kopš I. Pasaules kara noteikušas, ka politisku partiju no interešu vai spiediena grupas atšķir skaidra ideoloģiska nostādne un masveidīgums. Aukstā kara beigas, tehnoloģiju un izglītības ietekme ir mainījušas tradicionālas Rietumu sabiedrības, jeb kā R.Inglehart to apzīmēja, ir notikusi "klusā revolūcija". Individuālisms un salīdzinošais labklājības pieaugums ir mainījis ierastos uzvedības paradumus, samazinājis vēlētāju uzticību politiskajām partijām labējā kā arī kreisajā socioekonomiskajā flangā. Šīs izmaiņas ir ietekmējušas Austrumeiropas valstis, un to skaitā ari Latviju.

Īss ievads

1990.g. sākumā Tautas Frontes un Interfrontes politiskās apvienības bija noteicošie spēki Augstākajā Padomē (AP), no kuriem tad pakāpeniski izšķīlās LC, Saskaņa Latvijai, Līdztiesība, Zemnieku savienība, Demokrātiskā partija Saimnieks, Tautsaimnieku politiskā apvienība, TB, Tautas saskaņas partija un "nemanot" izzuda LKP(!). Bija pārstāvēta arī Zaļā partija un LNNK, un patiesībā tas ir nozīmīgi, jo tieši šajās kustībās (domāju VAK un LNNK) bija pilsonisko grupu pārstāvji kuri atšķirībā no kādreizējās LKP nomenklatūras veidoja vienīgo t.s. grassroots alternatīvu 5.Saeimā (lai arī Zaļie neguva pārstāvniecību un iekļuva 1991.g. dibinātie Kristīgie Demokrāti).

Politiskā vide bija kļuvusi sadrumstalota, sekojot AP divu lielāko pol. apvienību tradīcju inercei Latvijā izveidojās politisko kultūru turpmākos gadus indējošais dalījums etniski definētajās partijās. 1992.g. ar modifikācijām pieņemtais vēlēšanu likums ļāva nodrošināt zināmu sistēmas stabilitāti, jo ierindas Latvijas vēlētāju bija vienkārši mānīt ar 5. kolonnu un citiem mītiem. Bez tik nepieciešamajām disksijām sabiedrībā atjaunojot 1934.g. 15. maijā pātraukto Satversmes darbību, vienošanās par valsts turpmāko attīstību nebija notikusi, kura ļāva izveidot auglīgu augsni SIA Latvijas republika... Visam pa vidu likumdevējiem "aizmirsās" mantas un nodokļu sākumdeklarēšanās, tik nepieciešamās reformas policijā, izglītībā, veselības aizsardzībā, un sociālā nodrošinājuma sistēma tika atliktas (jo īstermiņa intereses prevalēja) un "tautiskā anarhija" varēja netraucēti turpināties līdz pat 2007.g., kad pilsoniskā sabiedrība atkal pamodās, un vienam premjeram nomainot otru, beidzot nonācām līdz Valdim Dombrovskim.

Dombrovska valdība|s un V

Pieņemu, ka nozīmīgākais iemesls, kāpēc V.Dombrovskis 2009.g. martā pārņēma varas grožus, bija apjukums Latvijas tradicionālajā politiskajā nomenklatūrā, kura vairs nemācēja izžonglēt sev optimālāko varas nepārtrauktības formulu. To ietekmēja starptautiskā finanšu krīze un ES līdzdalības paģērētās poltiskās pārmaiņas ar kuru dziļumu nomenklatūras pārstāvji iespējams nebija rēķinājušies. Tāpēc veicot valsts un pašvaldību pārvaldes aparāta un funkciju sanāciju visupirms no "kuģa nolēca" TP. Valdošajā koalīcijā viedokļu saskaņošana "sanācijas apstākļos" noteikti atšķiras no tautsaimniecības izaugsmes laika. Tāpēc skatoties uz 2010.g. 3. novembrī apstiprināto valdošās koalīcijas modeli, var teikt tik to, ka "sanācijas apstākļi" turpinās, partiju politiskajā attīstībā esam back in square one. Līdz ar to patiesībā partiju veidošana vienlaicīgi ar valsts pārvaldes sistēmas transformācijām nav tās pateicīgākās nodarbes skatoties no īstermiņa ieguvumu viedokļa, jo reitingi kritīs...

Neskatoties uz reitingiem Valdis Dombrovskis ar savu mieru palīdz kabinetam mērķtiecīgi turpināt pārvaldes sistēmas sanāciju, kaut arī ir sfēras kurā sistēmas attīrīšana nav notikusi tik ātri un dziļi, kā daži varbūt būtu vēlējušies. Reformu ātrumu un dziļumu noteikti ietekmē valdošo politisko partiju apvienību darbības principi un lēmumu pieņemšanas ātrums. "Vienotībā" (V) notiekošo vislabāk raksturo spīvās diskusijas parlamenta frakcijā, un, ja arī dažkārt V valdes vai vadītāja lēmumi nav skaidri, tad tos frakcijā vai valdes sēdēs ir iespējams izdiskutēt. Šis process ir laikietilpīgs, bet demokrātisks. V vēlētāji un atbalstītāji ir dažādu strāvojumu atbalstītāji, jo V pēc būtības ir centriska partiju apvienība kura apvieno ekonomiski liberālus, nacionāli konservatīvus un sociāli liberālus pārstāvjus.

Šobrīd diskusiju rezultātā veidojas platforma kuras rezultātā iepriekš minētajiem pārstāvjiem būs pašiem jānosaka - kāda tad būs centriskās V ideoloģija. Šis darbs notiek, un no sākotnējām diskusijām var noprast, ka centriskā V būs ar sociāli atbildīgu tautsaimniecības programmu un ne tik nacionāli konservatīva, kā piemēram LZS vai VL. Viedokļu saskaņošana nav no vienkāršajām, bet strīdos dzimst taisnība. Tikai no 2012.gs. partiju administratīvās darbības uzturēšanai varēs izmantot budžeta naudu, tāpēc šobrīd Latvijas partijām vai partiju pavienībām jāiztiek no biedru naudām un ziedojumiem. Kombinācija, kur uzticības zudums nozīmīgajām demokrātiskas pārvaldes institūcijām iet roku rokā ar iedzīvotāju nomācošo vairākumu, kuri nevēlas darboties ne partijās ne arī sabiedriskajās organizācijās, nav no labākajām. Tomēr, lai arī LV iedzīvotāju uzticība ir ļoti zema salīdzinot ar Skandināvijas valstu un Igaunijas uzticības rādītājiem pārvaldes institūcijām, tomēr pēdējais Eurobarometer pētījums ļauj izdarīt pieņēmumu par sistēmas stabilizāciju salīdzinot ar 2007-2009.g. graujošajiem uzticības rādītājiem. Sistēmas stabilizācija ir pozitīva un ļauj cerēt, ka no SIA Latvija republika evolucionārā ceļā ir iespējams nonākt līdz Rietumu pasaulē pieņemtas demokrātiskās konsolidācijas, kur pilsoņu līdzdalība ietekmē valsts salīdzinošo labklājību un pozīcijas starptautiskajā sistēmā. Tāpēc nobeidzot šo polemisko atbildi "epistulārajam līdzcīnītājam" centīšos ieskicēt tuvāko nākotni.

V un turpmākā ceļa karte

Gata Kokina iezīmētais scenārijs ir tikai viens no nākotnes redzējumiem. Ļoti raupji analizējot šodienas situāciju Latvijā mums ir izveidojusies situācija kur partiju politiskajā līmenī mums izveidojusies viena pilsētas un viena lauku latviešu partiju apvienība, krievu partiju apvienība, un vesels lērums sīkpartiju.

Šāda situācija nav optimāla jo turpina etnisko dalījumu kurš iepriekšējos gados ir indējis politisko vidi. Lai arī SC vidē ir ļaudis kuri fano par Somijas piemēru ar zviedru minoritāti domāju, ka viņi īsti neizprot Somijas vēsturi (Zviedru etniskās minoritātes loma atbalstot Somijas valstiskumu un vēlāk atbalsts Somijas iekļaušanai Ziemeļvalstu saimē), un nākotnes izvērsumā šodienas SC varētu cierēt, ja tad, uz RKP lomu. Tomēr SC loma un nākotne ir cits temats, un tāpēc atgriezīšos pie V.

Dibinot partijas un piedaloties Eiropas integrācijas procesā tiek izmantoti vēsturiski piemēri. Eiropas vecās demokrātijas zinām ar skaidri nepārprotamiem partiju nosaukumiem un tās var kalpot par gana labiem ceļa rādītājiem, lai arī ir pretēji piemēri:) Latvijas piemēri - LC, Saimnieks, Jaunais Laiks, Saskaņas Centrs, SCP, Atbildība - ir radījuši ne tikai neizpratni manu kolēģu vidū par partiju socioekonomisko orientāciju, bet tie ir dezorientējuši arī Latvijas vēlētāju un padarījuši tos imūnus pret Latvijas demokrātisko elitārismu. Tāpēc, piemēram, pirms SCP 2010.g. kongresa piedāvāju apdomāt vai nebūtu lietderīgi nosaukt SCP par Centra vai Liberālo centra partiju, tomēr pārāk neuzstāju uz šo risinājumu, jo tajā brīdī bija svarīgāki jautājumi risināmi. Šodienas Latvijas situācijā lieti der pārfrāzēt bijušo Krievijas premjeru Černomirdinu: "ka pēc PSRS sabrukuma veidojot jaunas partijas bijusi vēlme veidot ko savādāku, bet galu galā sanācis PSKP". Tomēr, vērojot šodienas politisko vidi Latvijā secinu, ka ne visi politiskie veidojumi ir "atsitušies 20.gs. goda un sirdzsapziņas partijā", lai arī partiju iekšējai demokratizācijai vēl darba pulka (domnīcas, ideoloģiski informatīvo materiālu sagatavošana, ētikas komisijas, vēlētāju izglītošanas pasākumi un tml.)

Veidojot V šobrīd neredzu tās ligas kuras vajājušas demokrātiskā centrālisma principu vadītas izbijušas partijas. Dažādu strāvojumu V cilvēkos redzu vēlmi veikt tās reformas kuras pēdējos 20.g. atliktas (0 deklarācija, progresīvais nodoklis, komerclikuma un vēlēšanu likuma izmaiņas utt. un tjpr.), jeb demontēt AAA komandas loloto SIA Latvijas republiku. Paredzu, ka iestarpināsi par V koalīcijas partneri, bet vienīgā atbilde šobrīd: "tiesiskas valsts dzirnas maļ lēnām, bet pamatīgi". Visupirms sagaidīsim Anglijas un Velsas Augstākās Tiesas lēmumu, un tad jau varēsim mērīt sadarbības temperatūru koalīcijā. Pēc šo likumu institucionalizācijas neizbēgama būs Latvijas politikas vides nostabilizēšanās un politiskās kultūras daļēja uzlabošanās. Tomēr tautsaimniecības izaugsmes tempu pieaugumu pieredzēsim tikai tad, ja iedzīvotāji turpinās iesaistīties sabiedrības pārvaldē, un neļaus valdībai un Saeimai gulēt uz sasniegtā lauriem, pieprasīs likuma varu un būs neiecietīgi pret korupciju un tml.

Tāpēc runājot par SCP un tās rīcību secinājums ir vienkāršs, SCP reitingi bija objektīvu iemeslu radīti. Lai arī vēlme bija ieņemt "brīvo sociāldemokrātisko|progresīvo nišu" tomēr politiķu ambīcijas, LSDSP implozija un Latvijas vēlētāju inerce saistīt progresīvu politiku ar etnisku piederību nepalīdzēja šo jautājumu risināt īstermiņā. Ja mēs tagad skatamies vēsturē uz SocDem partiju attīstību, tad tradicionāli tās izauga no arodbiedrību kustības, neapmierinātiem elites pārstāvjiem, vai vienkāršās strādniecības. Progresīvo politisko ideju pārstāvniecība šodien Latvijā ir sadrumstalota, līdzīgi kā konservatīvā vai liberālā pārstāvniecība. Tāpēc SCP, PS un JL lēmums par saplūšanu Vienotības partijā nav vērtējama vienkārši kā ilgtermiņa panaceja, bet galvenokārt kā stabilizējošs līdzeklis 20.g. atlikto reformu risināšanai un LV partiju politikas eiropeizācijai.

Demokrātiskās sistēmas konsolidācijai Latvijā būs nepieciešama ne tikai esošo politisko partiju darba pārvērtēšana, bet arī pilsonisko grupu aktivizēšanās zemākajā (grass roots level) līmenī. Vēl interesantāku šo situāciju padara LV dalība ES, jo neesam tālu no tā brīža, lai no Eiropas Parlamenta politiskajām grupām veidotos kaut kas līdzīgs pan-Eiropas politiskajām partijām. Tas gan ir jau cits temats, un pirms tam Latvijas 10.Saeimai un valdībai ir jābeidz virkne reformu, kurām būs jānostiprina likuma vara un jākalpo par socioekonomiskās ideoloģijās sakņotu pamatu daudzskaitlīgu liberālu, konservatīvu, progresīvu un centrisku politisku partiju attīstībai.

Debates in the Lettish parliament

2011-01-27T22:09:00.000-08:00

Foreign policy debates in the Lettish parliament are back to stay! One may wonder why I am so confident about it? Answer is rather simple, because the logic of political debate determines that one must discuss something that is appealing to the average voter's ears and foreign policy issues will always sound better than marginal change of value added tax or change of transformation of urban zoning law etc. It was positive to witness thus many ambassadors present in person and swarming of TV crews which tried to make yesterday's event into media event.

Even though the Minister of Foreign Affairs slipped his tongue in a funny way the debates in the parliament showed consensus - that irrespective of the political affiliation all the political groups in the parliament publicly support ongoing and present strategic goals of the Republic of Latvia. Debates looked dry from the first instant and if not Atis Lejiņš public speech endowments the whole event could be characterized as a dry bureaucratic occasion.

Also the former prime minister created quite a stir when contrary to his party traditional position he came out of a closet to support the creation of the United States of Europe. Janīna Kursīte tried to keep her Baltic line and referred to the problems stemming from the irony that Latvians and Lithuanians have to mutually learn about the developments in neighbors' country through the means of Russian media. Several MP's and the Minister of Defense emphasized the need to invest more in programs of development assistance particularly keeping in mind Latvian efforts with other coalition partners to reconstruct the civil war torn Afghanistan. Debates lasted almost five hours and institutionalized a new tradition in the Lettish parliament. Gradually Latvian political life returns back to normal but to announce that normalcy has returned to the economically worse hit EU member state there are still very specific structural reforms to be done.

Foreign policy continues the domestic one

2011-01-26T21:02:00.001-08:00

Exactly ninety years ago Entente powers recognized Estonia and Latvia de jure. Due to such an important commemoration there were special events organized both in Latvia and Estonia. Personally attended the occasion in Riga, which was jointly organized by the Latvian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Ambassade de France a Riga, and well attended. Presentations were extremely rich with historic data that was arbitrarily "forgotten" or not known in the Latvia during the interwar period and the following Soviet occupation. To commemorate this date also foreign policy debates are back in the Latvian parliament. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs produced a document and yesterday the Foreign Affairs Committee held its preliminary session with the most prominent Latvian foreign policy experts present.

Today there will be a possibility to observe public speech endowments of the Latvian MP's and ministers. The reason why I said that foreign policy debates are back in the parliament is the fact that from 2005 - 2010 rational and productive debates about any policy issues were actually absent from the Latvian talking shop (parliamentary debates in old democracies are mostly used to discuss policy issues and not only to push YEA and NAY buttons). Since the 2010 parliamentary elections the culture of political debates is back in the Latvian parliament, and I have witnessed it for the last 2 months. Foreign policy debatee in today's parliament could institute a tradition to have annual foreign policy debates in the parliament not only to commemorate foundations of the republic, but also to give the law giving branch of power to exercise its powers at its fullest. Also it is symbolic that due to this special occasion the speaker of the Latvian parliament was in Tallinn to discuss the upgrading of the work of the Baltic Assembly in order to give a new dimension for the good neighborly relations between the Baltic States.

All the previously mentioned events signify reappearance of fresh ideas among Latvian policy makers. However, they also signify that there are still ample to do in Latvia in order not only to have wholesome foreign policy debates in the parliament, but also to provide the Latvian public with means to discuss foreign policy on daily basis and to enable them to understand the fast changing global environment. This fact actually makes Estonia thus different from Latvia even though my Estonian colleagues would remind me that the Estonian situation is far from perfect. Indeed, Estonian situation cannot compete with Scandinavian countries or world's traditional powers yet when we want to analyze possibilities and mechanisms for wholesome foreign policy making, nurturing foreign policy experts, and enlightening the general public. Also the last argument is contestable because there is no country in the world where governments should take a duty in enlighting its general public about foreign policy issues, because those are mostly travails of free media.

And free media is the fact that distinguishes Latvia from Estonia among many other things. There are objective reasons for Latvia falling in a Freedom House rankings during past years. But my personal observations during last twenty years allow me to conclude that structurally media environments in two countries differ. It is not even the issue about the social science journals which have gradually evaporated into thin air in Latvia. The best example is if one compares contents of the Latvian and Estonian public media - in the Latvian TV there is one and half (!) program about foreign affairs if one considers the weekly De Facto as a program that from time to time covers also foreign policy issues. Also there is no such thing as the Estonian KUKU radio with its culture of political debate in Latvia. Finally the creation of the Estonian Public Broadcasting have started synergy on news making and allows to capitalize on being the best global source of the Estonian language news & culture. At the same time Latvian Public TV and Radio must compete with other commercial TV and radio stations in already lost battle for better ratings.

Also after the Latvian TV went digital there are still households who cannot adjust their old TV sets and thus afford viewing TV, and there are still areas particularly in Eastern Latvia where Russian and Bielorussian TV and radio reign supreme. Whenever you cross Latvian border to Estonia or Lithuanian the Latvian radio literally disappears from car radio after some ten kilometers of drive. Quite the contrary is with the Estonian and Lithuanian radio, because I use to listen Lithuanian news in my car in Riga and Estonian radio all the way until Bērzukrogs. So much about the technological capacity of the Latvian public broadcasters and I better wrap up in order to participate in today's debates in Saeima.

Traditionally the foreign policy starts at home with continuous increase of the governing capacity. Local public broadcasting is a particular area that has been neglected in Latvia for quite some time. Institution with a funny name - the National Electronic Media Council - is independent entity by law, but still being politically influenced without much transparency in their deliberations. In order to see new electronic media law being passed, the previously mentioned institution upgraded, and possibly new Latvian Pubic Broadcaster formed an agreement must first be formed in the present governing coalition. Until there is no such agreement it is futile to expect positive and Europeanized transformations in this field. After hopefully fruitful debates in the Saeima today it could eventually turn out as a next priority for the Unity political union in order to transform the Latvian public broadcasters into news source which could ensure continuation of broadcasting of an informed political debates and gradual transformation of the culture of political discussions.

Chips fall whenever an ax cuts...

2011-01-20T21:10:00.000-08:00

I have resumed posting... Interrupted my blogging activities because of my new duties and learning new responsibilities took some month to learn. Because I am combining new duties with my academic work there was the end of the year duties grading student's exams and essays, then Season's holidays and now finally there is a time and reasons for resuming blogging activities.

In the first post since resuming my blogging activities I have to write about events in Latvia again, even though there are several positive developments in the three Baltic States lately. Estonia joining Eurozone is just one example and my longer analysis will soon appear in pages of the Baltic Times. Also the prime ministers of 3B just returned from a very laborious visit to London which would possibly turn quite an interesting page for the development of the European North.

But now lets get down to business, because even though at the first instant the news would sound as a rather insignificant skirmish it eventually could turn out as another pseudo scandal in Latvia. After last parliamentary elections the opposition Harmony Center (HC) party increased its representation in the 100 member Latvian parliament to 29. The fact that opposition party increases its ranks is nothing new, because in the meantime HC also mismanaged its possibility to be a part of the expanded national unity government.

The present problem with the HC leader foaming and populist politicians increasing their political capital continues the inertia of uneducated political discourse in Latvia. The problem with MP Kravcovs not knowing Latvian language is primarily his personal problem and the fact that Mr Kravcovs was included into the party list shows also rather peculiar attitudes of the HC party. To those who have not followed development of this pseudo problem MP Kravcovs Latvian language abilities are thus scanty, that he needed translator's aid while being member of the Liepaja Town Council. The problem is that there is different legal regulation and while translator can take part in town council meetings it becomes problematic in the parliament sessions due to the intensity of work. Instead of leaving the problem for HC to solve internally the members of another opposition party and the State language inspection have started procedure of determining whether MP Kravcovs follows the law. I think that the opposition MP's and Language inspection with their latest activities give a wrong signal, because they want to deal with effects and not causes of the problem. MP Kravcovs pseudo problem is something that should be discussed from the point of view of efficiency of the parliamentary work not knowledge of language.

Therefore I want to reemphasize that the problem of MP Kravcovs not knowing the Latvian language is primarily his and his political party problem, because in reality there are 29-1 HC members of parliament, when "language less" MP Kravcovs in reality is able to perform only his stunt duties. It also shows that Latvian language is not an issue the HC party really care, if they did not filter skills & abilities of their candidates prior including them into the election lists. Or maybe HC party was thus upbeat, that they really thought that they will simply cruise to home base in 2010 October elections and did not pay attention to such issues?

Anyway, the MP Kravcovs pseudo problem is an example how during the last twenty years both the Russophone and Latvian populist politicians engineered profitable discourse that allowed them to get elected. The chips fall whenever ax cuts to paraphrase the all problematique here, and unfortunately traditionally Latvian politicians have focused only on chips... Since last elections, when Latvian electorate showed its mature determination with assigning sixty percent of the former MP's into the heap of history, Latvian civil society witnessed certain rebirth. Therefore I hope that the MP Kravcovs pseudo problem would naturally get extinct, and MP's would continue to work with policy issues that would ensure Latvian politicians to focus also on ax & tree or overhauling stagnated political and economic structure.

The 16th government in LV since independence in 1991

2010-11-03T21:07:00.000-07:00

According to Latvian Constitution it is the President who asks the future prime minister to form the cabinet (Art. 56). Following political traditions usually it is the leader of the winning political party who leads the cabinet formation after elections. It means that for a month the coordination process (as determined by the constitution) between majority winning political parties|political unions and consultations with the president's chancellery takes place between the elections and the first session of the parliament.

The Unity political union (New Era, Civic Union and Society for Another politics political parties) won the elections and gained a third of 100 member parliament's seats, and Valdis Dombrovskis started forming the future Latvian cabinet. At first there was a chance to form truly formative Latvian grand coalition government, however due to disagreements within Unity political union, at the end the Unity and the Union of Greens and Farmers (UGF) formed the new cabinet.

Last Friday the first version of the new government declaration became available, and now this 29. page long document is fully accessible for scrutiny. Yesterday the 10th Latvian Saeima (parliament) convened for the emergency session and with the 63 YEA and 35 NAY votes approved the new Latvian Cabinet. In the 16th Cabinet since Latvia restored its independence in 1991 there are now seven ministers from the Unity and six from the UGF party. The new cabinet formation was rather bumpy and thus there are pundits who do not predict the government a long tenure. My personal views together with other colleagues are expressed here. I am more inclined to believe that if Valdis Dombrovsksis would be able to focus on his immense inner qualities he could become the longest serving PM in the Latvian history. It would essentially mean that starting from 2012 onwards Mr Dombrovskis would have to change his present austerity measures discourse to one that would inspire Latvian folks to jump start their political and economic system in new quality. For such discourse transformation there is a dire need to transform antiquated state administrative procedures and agencies. The Latvian Internal Revenue Service and Ministry of Education structure and personnel policies must be overhauled in order to achieve structural changes in Latvian economy. The rule of law without shake up of Latvian courts is impossible and last but not least the mandatory property and tax declaration system must be passed as soon as possible, because it is looooooooong overdue. Thus, if these reforms would be accomplished Latvian people could regain the trust in democratic governance and would most probably follow the new challenges that the new and R&D powered economy would pose.

The Latvian new Cabinet started its work yesterday and with high probability the author of these lines would start facing new challenges in his life. Due to my future job requirements I would not be able to comment on Latvian domestic politics in blogosphere as often anymore. However, I would continue to publish once monthly in the Baltic Times and add to the ongoing scientific research.

Official results of the October 2 elections in Latvia

2010-10-18T13:50:00.000-07:00

It has been known already that political unions are inherently unstable and during last parliamentary elections only political unions were elected into the Latvian Parliament (Saeima). Purists would remind me that Harmony Centre has transformed into the political force which tends to position itself as a social democratic party. That is right but the heterogeneity of its membership, lack of truly democratic decision making process within that party, and relatively young age of the Harmony Centre party allows me to categorize it more like a political union rather than a stable party. But the internal composition of the political unions is not the issue I want to discuss tonight but rather to publish the latest significant news about the late elections.

Since almost two weeks it is announced that he Unity won the most seats (33) in the 100 member parliament, Harmony Center (29) came second, Union of Greens of Farmers (22) came third, and All for Latvia & For Good Latvia got eight seats each. The possible size and program of the governing coalition is still negotiated and incumbent Prime Minister Valdis Dombrovskis is prime figure behind this process.

Positions of different political unions was known so far but exact knowledge about who is who in the new parliament was officially announced only today. Since we have the official information (see below) it is possible to finally evaluate possible candidates for ministerial positions and their replacements into the new parliament. That would be most probably the next entry, because there is still about two weeks until the first session of the 10th Saeima, and the negotiations about the new governing coalition are bitter at times when all attention should be actually focused on the overhaul of the antiquated economic structure and boosting "green shoots" of the nascent economy.

Photo: Ieva Čīka/LETA

UNITY (33)

From the Riga electoral district: Ģirts Valdis Kristovskis (PS), Ojārs Kalniņš (PS), Lolita Čigāne (PS), Rasma Kārkliņa (PS), Ints Dālderis (JL), Inguna Rībena (JL), Andris Buiķis (JL), Ilze Viņķele (PS), Imants Lieģis (PS).

From the Livonian electoral district: Valdis Dombrovskis (JL), Artis Pabriks (SCP), Ilma Čepāne (PS), Ainars Latkovskis (JL), Ina Druviete (PS), Edvards Smiltēns (SCP), Andris Vilks (PS), Arvils Ašeradens (PS), Dzintars Ābiķis (SCP), Guntars Galvanovskis (JL), Dzintra Hirša (PS) un Ingmārs Čaklais (PS).

From the Latgale electoral district: Aleksejs Loskutovs (SCP) un Kārlis Šadurskis (PS),

From the electoral district in Courland: Solvita Āboltiņa (JL), Janīna Kursīte-Pakule (PS), Silva Bendrāte (JL) un Ingrīda Circene (JL).

From the electoral district in Semigallen: Sarmīte Ēlerte (PS), Artis Kampars (JL), Dzintars Zaķis (JL), Atis Lejiņš (SCP), Aigars Štokenbergs (SCP) un Klāvs Olšteins (JL).

HARMONY CENTER (29)

From the Riga electoral district: Jānis Urbanovičs, Sergejs Dolgopolovs, Andrejs Klementjevs, Artūrs Rubiks, Boriss Cilevičs, Sergejs Mirskis, Nikolajs Kabanovs, Igors Pimenovs, Mihails Zemļinskis, Igors Meļņikovs, Aleksejs Holostovs, Ņikita Ņikoforovs un Igors Zujevs.

From the Livonian electoral district: Ivans Klementjevs, Jānis Ādamsons, Juris Silovs, Aleksandrs Sakovskis.

From the Latgale electoral district: Jānis Tutins, Raimonds Rubiks, Ivans Ribakovs, Vladimirs Nikonovs, Aleksandrs Jakimovs, Aleksejs Burunovs, Sergejs Fjodorovs, Dmitrijs Rodionovs,

From the electoral district in Courland: Valērijs Agešins, Valērijs Kravcovs.

From the electoral district in Semigallen: Valentīns Grigorjevs un Vitālijs Orlovs.

UNION OF GREENS AND FARMERS (22)

From the Riga electoral district: Raimonds Vējonis, Kārlis Seržants, Jānis Strazdiņš,

From the Livonian electoral district: Jānis Dūklavs, Ingmārs Līdaka, Iveta Grigule, Armands Krauze, Vitauts Staņa, Andris Bērziņš

From the electoral district in Semigallen: Augusts Brigmanis, Andris Bērziņš, Uldis Augulis, Dace Reinika, Aivars Dronka

From the Latgale electoral district: Staņislavs Šķesters, Jānis Klaužs un Rihards Eigims

From the electoral district in Courland: Gundars Daudze, Aija Barča, Dana Reizniece, Oskars Zīds un Jānis Vucāns.

FOR GOOD LATVIA (8)

No Rīgas ievēlēti - Ainārs un Inese Šleseri (LPP/LC)

No Kurzemes ievēlēts Edgars Zalāns (TP)

No Vidzemes ievēlēti: Māris Kučinskis (TP) un Guntis Ulmanis

No Latgales ievēlēti: Rita Strode (LPP/LC) un Imants Bekešs,

No Zemgales ievēlēts Andris Šķēle (TP)

ALL FOR LATVIA (8)

No Rīgas ievēlēti: Dzintars Rasnačs (TB/LNNK) un Einārs Cilinskis (VL)

No Vidzemes ievēlēti: Raivis Dzintars (VL), Visvaldis Lācis (VL), Jānis Dombrava (VL)

No Latgales ievēlēta Inese Laizāne (VL)

No Kurzemes ievēlēts Gaidis Bērziņš (TB/LNNK)

No Zemgales ievēlēts Imants Parādnieks (VL)

P.S. Here are links to my latest articles on LV elections in Postimees, Delfi, Ukrainian daily, and TBT

Apņēmība un slava

2010-10-14T05:24:00.000-07:00

Latvieši met izaicinājumu vispārzināmām patiesībām, atkal ievēlot krīzes valdību
Latvijas nesenie notikumi ir likuši pārskatīt vairākas modernās politekonomijas aksiomas. Pirmkārt, saglabāt stabilu valūtu sabrukuma apstākļos ir pašnāvnieciski. Latvija saglabāja savu eiro piesaistīto valūtu un ir atguvusi konkurētspēju, pateicoties t.s. iekšējai devalvācijai - lielu sabiedrisko tēriņu un algu samazināšanai. Finansu optimizācija pielīdzināma ap 14% no iekšzemes kopprodukta.
Pastāv aksioma, ka vēlētāji soda valdības, kuras uzspiež stingru ekonomisko politiku. Bet premjerministra Valda Dombrovska vadītā koalīcija uzvarēja 2. oktobra parlamenta vēlēšanās ar 58,6% balsu, par spīti tam, ka pārraudzīja iekšzemes kopprodukta krišanos par rekordlieliem - 18% - 2009. gadā. V. Dombrovska partija Vienotība gandrīz divkāršoja savu vietu skaitu parlamentā - tā ieguva 33 no 100 vietām.
Vēlētāji atspēkoja arī citu pieņēmumu,- ka nauda neizbēgami izkropļo politisko procesu, sevišķi nabadzīgajās valstīs. Galvenā oligarhu partiju apvienība Par labu Latviju tika sagrauta līdz 8 vietām, kaut gan tā bagātīgi šķieda naudu priekšvēlēšanu kampaņai, no-pērkot pat vispopulārāko neatkarīgo avīzi valstī. Vēlētāji, izrādās, pamatoti to vainoja par neapdomīgu politku treknajos gados. Pirms tam šīm pie apvienības piederīgām partijām Saeimā bija 33 vietas.
Ārzemnieki, kuri aizdeva Latvijai 7,5 miljardus eiro, ir atviegloti. Ekonomika atkal pieaug ar straujo eksporta un rūpniecības produkcijas kāpumu (gan saglabājas augsts bezdarbs ). Bet V.Dombrovskim ir jārisina jauna problēma. Ir parādījies jauns politiskais spēks –Saskaņas Centrs – centriski kreisa partija, kas galvenokārt apvieno etniskos krievus un pa daļai arī tos latviešus, kas ir vīlušies esošajās partijās. Saskaņas centrs jaunajā parlamentā ieguvis 29 vietas.
Saskaņas centrs varētu mēģināt aizvilināt Dombrovska galvenos partnerus - Zaļo un Zemnieku savienību, kura ieguvusi 22 vietas. Lai to novērstu, Dombrovskis varētu piedāvāt SC darījumu - nākt vismazākās koalīcijas partijas vietā, kurai ir 8 vietas. Tā ir ultranacionālistu apvienība ar netīkamām manierēm.
SC jau ir pie varas galvaspilsētā Rīgā. Taču ievest prokrievisku partiju nacionālā valdībā būtu liels politisks risks, un tāpēc Dombrovskis varētu izvēlēties turēties kopā ar jau esošajiem partneriem. Jaunā valdība jāizveido līdz 2. novembrim. Tad jāsāk strādāt pie nākamā gada budžeta. Tas nozīmēs vēl vairāk samazināt izdevumus un palielināt nodokļus, lai izpildītu starptautisko aizdevēju prasību - ievērot 6% budžeta deficīta no iekšzemes kopprodukta. Bet, lai izpildītu valdības mērķi - 2014. gadā ieviest eiro-, ar to varētu arī nepietikt.

P.S. Good friend Janis Irbe from Geneva sent me translation of this The Economist article and asked me to publish it, because he thinks it is essential to spread this info also in Latvian!

Parliamentary elections in Latvia - democracy won!

2010-10-02T09:38:00.000-07:00

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!!!

The list of corrupt politicians to be announced!

2010-09-28T00:38:00.000-07:00

According to Apollo the list of allegedly corrupt politicians who received payments from the long lasting Major of Ventspils should be announced in October 30, 2010 less than two days prior formative parliamentary elections in Latvia.

This is truly great news because publishing of the list of politicians who were eating from hands of the first member of the notorious AAA team, to put it into local colloquial, could unravel the corrupt networks of former and existing nomenclature in the post independence Latvia, which have strangled Latvia's development for the last nineteen years.

Lets wait and see now!

Less than week to GO in Latvia

2010-09-26T22:36:00.000-07:00

Just five days have left till formative national elections in Latvia. For the first time since the reestablishment of the independence the election law would be tested without the unjust "party locomotive" system. Also the poisonous cleavage between the ethnic Latvian and Russian communities have been subdued so far and the whole election campaign have centered around the second cleavage in the Latvian society - one between democratic and illiberal political party groups. The biggest spenders of this year's political campaign are the oligarchic group "For Good Latvia" whose constitutive elements face court's decision on November 3, 2010. The court should decide whether parties (People's party & Latvian First|Latvian Way party union) who illegally got elected into the parliament in 2006 should repay about EUR 2mlj. into the state treasury?

A huge scandal is brewing in the national airliner Air Baltic Corporation (ABC) because according to IR the minority shareholder Baltijas Aviācijas Sistēmas has received circa EUR 150 000 payment from the majority shareholder ABC for using Air Baltic brand names while head of both minority and majority shareholder is the same person - Bertold Flick. The whole affair with Air Baltic brand being sold under questionable circumstances without proper oversight looks like a scam again... particularly after Bertold Flick's sensational announcement about expanding down South and causing the PM to act.

It is hard to say now whether announcements from ABC are meant to divert attention from other questionable deals of the corruptocratic political party, however one thing is clear, the shenanigans from oligarchic parties have a lot to loose if they are acting thus brazenly prior the 2010 elections. Oligarchic parties have built their quasi-feudal fiefdoms for the last nineteen years under aegis of private capital accumulation, as one underling of the People's Party tried to explain me in one embassy reception last week. The person who is presently employed by Saeima did not trust my comments about private capital accumulation not necessary being equated with oligarchization and corruption in other European states, and honestly believed that odious Latvian AAA team has done everything (!) legally. In addition he tried to underline the latter argument with the fact that he himself is a legal specialist...

The discussion was not fruitful because instead of rational arguments belief onto the system of inviolability of state underlined the whole discourse. My reference to the morality were laughed at and question about philanthropist activities of the AAA team (similar to robber barons building universities, libraries and art galleries in the US) was accepted as something Latvian robber barons could have thought about...

Better Latvian robber barons and their cleptocratic retinue stay thinking and Latvian enlightened voters make a clear and decisive sweeping of the corrupt Augean stables this weekend, because the filling of private pockets under the naked banner of private capital accumulation| privatization has almost killed the goose that lays golden eggs. It is about time for Latvian voters to wake up, pass the corrupt politicians into the dumpster of history, and and let their positive energies GO!

Dare to dream, Latvian citizen!

2010-09-15T21:49:00.000-07:00

Time before elections is special and it cannot be truer in Latvia this year. The public opinion can be changed by internal implosion or endogenous pressure, and numerous events of the last three years facilitated reevaluation of some Latvian citizens’ comprehension about democratic citizenship. I am optimistic enough and believe that only if my compatriots would dare to dream better future could be ensured for Latvia. There have been several studies and ongoing investigations about the sorry state of the Latvian political culture. Analysis of past deeds requires looking back into the past, but already G.F.Hegel ominously concluded that: „the only thing we learn from history is that we never learn from it”. Thus, to avoid such propensity I have decided to look forward, and to paraphrase words from Martin Luther King I want to exclaim - dare to dream Latvian citizens!

I believe that the lack of humor in political discourse and artificial seriousness of the Latvian present political class in reality is a mask of inferiority complex. Those holding office would have to deal with their complexes themselves, and equally importantly it should not deter the rest of citizenry from joy of living, making fun, and dreaming!

Comfortable coach en route from Tallinn to Riga actually lulled me into a dream world a weak ago and I wanted to share it with my readers because of its positive undercurrent. Here goes: I saw the time prior to October 2, with all its major competitors. Predictions of sociologists and polls were right in predicting six major political unions contesting the battle, but at the end leaving only four largest winners. The campaign was fierce and there was plenty of mud slinging on Youtube and the TV brainwashing campaign was massive. Fortunately the festering cleavage between ethnic Latvians and Russians political parties became a nuisance and instead the political campaign centered on the second cleavage – the one between democratic and illiberal political forces.

September 2010 transformed the distrust among ethnic groups in Latvia because even though Union of Greens and Farmers was elected into the parliament Latvia got its first grand coalition consisting from Unity and Harmony Centre political unions. Opinions had to be reconciled within the Unity political group where traditional vision shortsightedly equated any leftist party with the Fifth Column of the former Metropolis. After that reciprocal statements from both political unions followed ensuring the wish to work for the benefit of all Latvians. Voters were convinced that for res publica to survive in long term and living standards to rise in foreseeable future Latvian middle class cannot support voracious lifestyle of self made oligarchic families anymore.

Major businessmen pouring ludicrous sums of monies into treasuries of the oligarchic parties gave a clear signal to Unity and Harmony Center voters about special interests and continued practice of state capture. However, without being elected their campaign financing disappeared into chimney of spin doctors’ mind boggling games. The agreement between two largest political forces came under leadership of Unity political group who entrusted Harmony Center government responsibility on equitable basis, and the head of the budget committee was entrusted to the representative of Greens and Farmers in order to break the antiquated tradition of emasculating opposition.

The coalition council served as a reform body which designed overhaul of antiquated Latvian governance and tax system. Thus, agreement right after elections was reached to introduce the mandatory tax declaration system and real estate amnesty law. Economists of two party groups agreed on rising real estate tax, and alleviating labor from excessive tax burden. The solution to the household debt was found and euro debts were converted into Latvian currency, and Latvian Development bank was founded to jumpstart Latvian small and medium size businesses. The cabinet returned to the principles of lean government, and comprehensive and universal remuneration system ensured corporate independence of the civil service system with principles of meritocracy finally institutionalized.

Political parties henceforth listened to academic representatives and ensured balanced development of body politics with timely legal amendments. Higher education reform established initially four public universities with later founding of the European center of academic excellence in Latvia with constantly increasing number of foreign students. Prosecutor General Office merged with Corruption Prevention Bureau and the new Prosecutor General after 2010 general elections after general reconciliation among political representatives issued arrest warrant to couple of most inconsiderate leaders of oligarchic clans.

Participation of Harmony Center in grand coalition allowed the Unity parties to discard unnecessary framing of Kremlin scare and pragmatically approach business opportunities in Russia. Eviction of obstacles to economic development fostered reconciliation among Latvian ethnic communities and the responsibility of being in the government made Harmony Center staunch supporters of the EU and NATO membership.

Latvia established not only its mediator’s role between the EU and Russia, but also became the world center of green energy and forestry studies. Passing the law on financing political parties from the state budget and establishing comprehensive campaign limits allowed think tanks of the political parties to pop up, and constitutive parties of the Unity and Harmony Center political unions gradually transformed into classical conservative, liberal, social democratic and green political forces.

And as for all the dreams also my bus from Tallinn had reached Riga bus terminal and I woke up to Latvian reality. But wait a minute, I contemplated again: “such dream scenario is actually possible only if Latvian politicians and voters would be courageous enough and dare to see alternative visions!”

P.S. Originally this article appeared in the Baltic Times September 9 edition
P.P.S. For Estonian readers here is my latest article in Postimees

Always Transforming but ''Permanent'' Governing Coalition in LV

2010-09-15T01:53:00.000-07:00

Colleagues from Providus and Jurģis Bērziņs just published a splendid iconographic chart.

It analyzes the last 10 years in LV politics and calculates for how many days which party was responsible managing certain sector of economy, and for how long parties/party coalitions have had power. Excellent job!

Messy Latvian party political culture

2010-09-02T23:42:00.000-07:00

Four years have passed since the 2006 parliamentary elections in Latvia. Even though the Supreme Court of Latvia ruled that election campaign was not truly legitimate, other Latvian courts still have not decided whether major culprits - People's & Latvian First and Latvian Way Union parties - are liable to repay illegally spent EUR 2 mlj. back into state treasury. Since the events four years back Latvian political environment has transformed and literally non of the political parties participate in the 2010 elections, even though almost all the same politicians would fight for the survival.

Purists would object me telling that there are still political parties in Latvia. Indeed there are circa 52 political parties/unions (State Company Registry (UR) data three months ago) in Latvia. But from thirteen party lists that are running for parliament in upcoming elections Cristian Democrats, and motley of strangely named parties like ''Daugave for Latvia'', ''People's Control'', ''Made in Latvia'', and ''For Presidential Republic'' are nowhere near the mandatory 5% threshold to enter the Saeima (parliament)... . Also, and even more importantly, only two (Union of Greens and Farmers and For Human Rights in Latvia) of the thirteen contenders for 100 seats in the parliament are founded prior 2006. The system is volatile and unfortunately classical political parties - conservatives, liberals, social democrats, greens - are not institutionalized in Latvia. Thus one may conclude that the party political system has pretty much returned to square one. Reasons for the party political system not being institutionalized are ample, and about those reasons there would be another blog entry coming soon.

In the following four charts I have used the ''Latvijas Fakti'', SKDS, and www.ir.lv data in order to roughly show alternations of support for the Latvian political parties/unions from January 2007 - August 2010.

SUPPORT for LV POLITICAL UNIONS 02.2008 - 07.2010

SUPPORT for LV POLITICAL PARTIES 01.2007 - 07.2010

SUPPORT for LV POLITICAL UNIONS July-August 2010 & POSSIBLE NUMBER OF SEATS IN THE PARLIAMENT

PERCENTAGE OF UNDECIDED VOTERS, THOSE WILLING TO VOTE FOR GOVERNMENT PARTIES, AND ALL OTHER POLITICAL PARTIES 01.2007 - 07.2010

Democratic systems and desire for a strong hand in Latvia

2010-08-07T01:21:00.000-07:00

The UN membership is a sign abut a country taking the responsibility to follow basic principles of participation in global civil society, even though there is neither enforcement agency to impose such principles, uniform model of democracy, nor the system for punishing countries that are complacent or ignorant enough. The Council of Europe(CE) in Strasbourg serves the gatekeeper role to ensure that the prospective EU members abide by democratic norms in their legislatures, and also the EU itself offers OMC method and other tools for upgrading governance of the union. There are sceptics who say that the UNO or EC does not solve state’s constitutive problems stemming from neoliberal rule of markets, but they forget that the primary reason d’être of those organizations is to ensure peace and stability, and in democracies those are people who have to demand better governance through participation.

Particularly for young democracies it is essential to follow the best guidelines of democratic governance, because abiding to those rules improves governing capacity of young states and ensures their long term economic development. Empirical evidence in Europe since the First World War infallibly demonstrates that democracies rather than other forms of government are better at ensuring economic sustainability and balanced development of society.

Since late 1980’s three Baltic States (3B) have developed their own version of democratic governance. In many EU countries there is wrong perception about the existence of the European democratic model. In reality there are twenty seven of them and none of them is perfect, even though there are scholars and politicians who want to emphasize normative virtues of a specific kind because of particular interests. Most democracies follow the path dependency strategy and thus their chosen electoral systems stem from constellation of domestic political factions. Therefore normative importance of domestic models should not be overemphasized.
There always were and will be certain rancor about the work of government in any democracy, and there are numerous politicians who tend to keep accountable international organizations for their own misbehavior. Major reason why opinion polls traditionally show low support for incumbent politicians is the nature of government that has to make also painful decisions within certain time frame while keeping in mind inherently heterogeneous interests in society. Neither Latvian nor Lithuanian people feel that their personal welfare would suddenly improve according to last Eurobarometer bi - annual survey. Participation in elections is declining for the last twenty years and indicates that 3B citizens are disillusioned about politics. However, quantity of disillusioned and alienated voters in Latvia is dangerously high (50% of electorate on average from March 2007 onwards according to ‘’Latvijas Fakti’’), and according to ‘’Diena’’ survey last year 30% of those polled would have agreed with coup d’état in order to bring back order. Numerous Latvian politicians from Union of Greens of Farmers, People’s Party and Latvian First Party/Latvian Way are directly responsible for oligarchic groups continuing practice of state capture with impunity. Now they rashly proclaim that strong presidentialism is the only medicine for present evils. Before making their announcements they could at least consult scholars whom they have failed to listen for the last twenty years. Thus inadequately educated politicians could have learned that semi – presidential system in Lithuania was not panacea, because distrust in domestic representative institutions is almost identical in Latvia and Lithuania. Besides, Estonia’s democratic system is almost identical to Latvia but it does not deliver such appalling results as much the trust in representative democracy is concerned.

Since Lithuanian and Estonian constitutional caucus and free elections in 1992 Estonian political system is not as politically polarized as in Lithuania, and Lithuania is characterized so far by stable single party majority democracy. Political party membership is declining throughout the industrially developed world, but absolutely the lowest membership in the EU is in Latvia. In Lithuania between parliamentary sessions the public opinion traditionally swung between the right and left, and in Estonia the political pendulum has swung between liberal and conservative forces. Regardless of the turbulence caused by the successful impeachment procedure of the President Paksas in Lithuania, one may largely conclude that Lithuanian and Estonian democracies are consolidated to use the terminology of Robert Dahl, while Latvian demos still democratizes.

Among reasons for Lithuania and Estonia being consolidated democracies are constitutional caucuses that consequently made political forces to find consensus in new constitution in 1992, and establish rule of law early on. Latvia is the only CEE country where irreconcilable political groups rolled over the 1922 Consitution with some amendments after the 1993 elections. I have used the constitutional argument in couple of previous articles, but it should not be overestimated, because in Austria, for example, the provisional constitution of 1920 has been continuously amended without being approved in nationwide referendum by competing political forces and allowed Austrian democracy to flourish.

Real problems of governance rather reside in laws that Latvian lawmakers evaded – mandatory tax and property declaration system, party financing from state budget, and functional limits for election campaign financing - thus gradually corrupting the political culture. Aivars Lembergs, Andris Skele, and Ainars Slesers disdain for the rule of law is not a secret. These authoritarian and corrupt politicians and their dubiously educated retinue probably ascertained that disrespect to the rule of law led to impeachment of the Lithuanian president R. Paksas. That is the major reason why their pocket parties continue to recklessly call for strong hand, allowing legal nihilism to prevail and hindering birth of genuine rule of law in Latvia. To remove obstruction to thus fundamental legal documents the Prosecutor General Office in collaboration with KNAB should suspend operation of the Latvian People’s Party, Latvian Way & Latvian First Party and hence political union For Good Latvia until the disbursement of about EUR 2 mlj. into state treasury is settled. Not only the Latvian Supreme Court made a precedent with their November 3, 2006 decision stating that previously mentioned parties broke the law. Also the Council of Europe Venice Commission recommendations as well as the UN good governance principles recommend due process in present circumstances.

This article originally appeared in July 28, 2010 the Baltic Times

Whether geography matters in the Baltic constructed ’’world’’?

2010-07-29T03:13:00.000-07:00

There are politicians in the Baltic States (3B) who persistently tend to emphasize the unique geographical position of their represented states. Thus the politicians continue to mislead themselves and broad swathes of society, because particularly since the end of the Cold War traditional relations between states, strategies of the military, and international trade policy has witnessed significant transformations.

Within the European Union 3B could be geographically unique indeed, because their size and relative weakness of interest groups should allow 3B to give up anachronistic vestiges of the nation state statecraft and be stellar examples of small but well governed economies. While Estonia has earned laudatory achievements due to its own merits Lithuania and Latvia still grapple with old fashioned premises of nation state governance. It is perhaps symptomatic that you barely hear from Estonian mainstream politicians mythical notions of historic destiny in matters of governance, because for a small, efficient and open economy it is essential to achieve results with available resources.

During the early 1990’s 3B experienced advantage of relatively abundant and cheap labor. Ever since early 1990’s underinvestment in education sector and rapid rise of comparative welfare determines now the future of 3B economies. The only factor of comparative advantage is its relatively free and pristine land. Those scholars and politicians who anachronistically follow geopolitical dictum and speak about the advantage of geographical position of 3B forget that geostrategic position foremost needs human infrastructure. To put it differently geography matters only with sustainable taxable income and here development of human resources has utmost importance.

Baltic ice free harbours connected by pipeline or railroad do not offer much value without population unable to sustain such primary infrastructure from their taxes. Today one may easily continue to be Estonian in Tahiti whilst watching the Estonian Broadcasting Corporation emissions via satellite and ordering his favourite merchandise or services via internet. Technologies and in the World Trade Organization embedded international trade flows are producing truly global economy. It changes old paradigms and brakes material borders. However, it is harder to break mental borders which were constructed into people’s minds through formal education system. Education systems are traditionally conservative, and what really distinguishes well developing and declining economies today are education systems that are able to reform. Ability to reemphasize countries’ prerogatives of foreign trade, upgrade governance, and invest in education as bedrock of viable democracy determines countries’ position in international pecking order. To measure just few international indexes (World Economic Forum, Pisa, UNPA e-government a.o.) it becomes apparent that Latvia continuously falls in terms of its development not only behind Estonia, but now also behind Lithuania and Poland.

3B are ideally positioned to learn from historic examples around them. Finland and West Germany as vanquished countries came out of the war as modernizers leaving anachronistic belief in geographical dictum behind them. At the same time it was the USSR before and now Russia which continues to construct the language of 19.century imperialism and under invests in its human and material infrastructure. Learning from other’s mistakes rather from one’s own distinguishes smart collectivities from not so smart ones. It would be advisable for 3B populations to wake up from wrong myths about ’’special geographical position’’ of their states, ’’bottomless Eastern market’’ or naive assumptions about their countries comparative advantages as ’’the real crossroads between the East and West’’. The 3B are tiny and depopulating, thus geography still matters when one must choose ones strategic partners.

Lithuanian Polish relations are exemplary as well as the Estonian – Finnish relations are institutionally flourishing today. Estonian, Latvian and Lithuanian unity with the Baltic Assembly regular sessions and specialized cooperation between particular branches of government looks good, but in reality the 3B cooperation is an elitist endavour without substantial interdependence.
The traditional promoter of the Baltic cooperation is unable to project Latvian soft power even domestically because of governance system being in shambles. Since avoidance of insolvency now Latvia 2.0 needs paradigmatic change of cooperation with its neighbors. Unfortunately Latvia has wasted nineteen years and its external space of maneuvering is limited. Latvian government must continue cooperation with its Baltic neighbors in economic and energy policies. Politically, however, Latvian political class must decide whether they want to develop embedded relations on axis with Scandinavian countries, Poland or Moscow. The infantile policy of oligarchic parties falsely claiming that Latvia is securely embedded in Western security structure and thus free to cooperate and trade with everyone in the East, North, South and West is wrong. Latvian oligarchic groups are thus poorly educated that they have not even learned the old maxim: ’’you cannot serve two kings at the same time’’. It is time for Latvian politicians to wake up from self inflicted and smug dream world, assess the dynamically transforming external environment and decide which path of development they want to emulate. Estonia is reassessing its economic relations with Russia as Lithuania does, but it goes through the transparent process of strengthening the domestic governing capacity and rule of law. Without Latvia 2.0 being implemented the outdated geographical dictum could eventually materialize, but it would not offer Latvia even a chance for a spot on ‘the crossroads between the East and West’’, but simply assign it to the proxy role of transit depot for Eastern hydrocarbon barons...

P.S. Originally this article appeared in the Baltic Times July 1, 2010 issue.

Political structure and formulation of national interest in 3B

2010-07-06T02:53:00.000-07:00

The prerequisite for the following of the national interest is the interest aggregation of similarly minded ideological groups of people and the ability of state entities to govern efficiently. Interest aggregation is a continuous process that stems from the foundations of the republic. Efficient government is based on promoting the best possible human resources, thus the virtues of meritocracy and home grown elites would prevail. Interest aggregation and efficient government in the Baltic States (3B) until 2004 were focused on overhauling their antiquated governance systems and fulfilling strategic goals.

In hindsight, one may determine that those alarmists in Riga and Vilnius, who blamed Tallinn for using public relations strategies in order to be invited to start EU membership negotiations after the Luxembourg Summit in 1997 were wrong. Estonia used membership in the Western Club organizations as a means to an end, and such strategy has served Estonia well so far. In May 2010, Estonia was invited to become a member of the OECD and probably in early 2011 would become the member of Euroland.

There are academics and politicians who caution Estonia against entering into the eurozone at a time when the unique currency is undergoing its biggest crisis since its introduction in 1999. There are authors with apocalyptic visions about the demise of the Euroland and EU, but representatives of moderate views are gaining consensus about the roots of the economic and financial governance in the EU - the lack of leadership and inability of the domestic actors to adapt to the dynamic change that is endogenously formulated.

Development strategies have been formulated in the UN and EU, and, since the end of the Cold War, also in the World Bank and IMF volumes of literature have been written about the different policy mix needed to achieve the desired results. The bottom line for achieving tangible results, however, is the ability of domestic political forces to adapt to the dynamic international environment and thus continuously reformulate opportunities that the global marketplace of ideas

Writing of new constitutions in Estonia and Lithuania, differently from Latvia, allowed elites to reemphasize the ideals of their republics and establish generally accepted rules of the game, thus they could readjust their national interest within a level playing field See net neutrality. after major strategic achievements.

Since the early 1990s the power in Lithuania has oscillated between conservative and social democratic majority coalitions. Upgrading of the Lithuanian polity culminated in establishing a mixed voting system as well as in establishing the semi-presidential system. The Estonian coalition of liberal, conservative and moderate political forces have traditionally united against the political depredations of the founder of the Center Party, Mr. Edgar Savisaar. Since the last parliamentary elections, and particularly since local elections in 2009, one may notice that the Estonian party system is transforming after the leadership change among the Social Democrats and heavy disagreements in the People's Union party. The upcoming parliamentary elections in 2011 will probably be hard fought.

It will be interesting to see whether development strategies of the right wing coalition will have credible alternatives coming from the Estonian center left coalition. The absence of mutually accepted rules of the political game differentiates Latvia's development from its Baltic neighbors. The Eurobarometer survey shows that in terms of general distrust in their representative institutions, Estonia is a positive exception among the 3B. Therefore, present Latvian negative exceptionalism is explained with the avoidance of insolvency, doubling of the rate of national debt and continuous political crisis.

Navigating the national economy in times of global economic and financial crisis is a formidable task. The efforts of Mr. Kubilius' government, with President Grybauskaite, to balance formulation of the national interest and to cut red tape do not make him popular. However, the task of Mr. Kubilius is made understandable for the average voter because it was the coalition government, led by the Lithuanian Social Democrats which governed Lithuania into recession and lost in the elections as a result. Latvia's dilapidated governing coalition is unnatural, and ethnic Latvian vs. Russian as well as democratic vs. oligarchic cleavages cut across Latvia's political spectrum.

It is nearly impossible to agree on future development strategies when blackmail, filibustering and populism prevail in the Latvian political culture. In such an environment sound advice of Western partners is not heard, short term policies are embedded, and external enemies are continuously reframed in order to consolidate undecided voters. It only fosters resentment and apathy, when politicians with questionable credentials are pushed through the political machinery to become members of the Constitutional Court, or when the work of the Corruption Prevention Bureau is undermined with the appointment of a heavily indebted person at its helm.

Latvia's ageing population is waiting for unequivocally understood rules of the game, while the younger generation adds to the increasing brain drain. A positive outcome of the October 2010 elections is a prerequisite for the formulation of long term national interests. Traditional political parties in Latvia This is a list of political parties in Latvia.

Latvia has a multi-party system, where no one party often has a chance of gaining power alone, and parties must work with each other to form coalition governments. continue to rely on questionable strategies of spin-doctors, and clearly defined economic programs for stopping deindustrialization and eradicating roots of political crisis that would transcend existing cleavages in society are not yet presented. With such a strategy Latvia's political class continues to fall behind its vexed Baltic neighbors, and gives ample tools to the folks who question the very existence of Latvia.

P.S. Originally this article appeared in the Baltic Times May 27, 2010 issue.

P.P.S. The June TBT article you can access here, latest piece for Estonian readers you may find here, and for the Latvian readers there is something here.

LV October 2010 election campaign symbolism

2010-06-07T21:58:00.000-07:00

Gatis Šļūka is prophetic and managed to capture symbolic meaning of the 2010 elections in Latvia!

[They are not going to step on this enormous rake AGAIN!]
[Oh my, they will! You just need to advertise it ENOUGH]

FOR [BRAIN]WASHED LATVIA

[Who is going to meet voters eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth?]
[Otomārs should go, because he has neither teeth left nor good eyesight]

The Minister of Finance to the PM Dombrovskis [We put the new battery (IMF) in, but the van still does not start!]

TRANSfiguration of the political system

2010-06-03T05:51:00.001-07:00

Transfiguration is usually referred to the religious and miraculous transformations. To avoid meddling into sphere of divine I underlined the TRANS part in order to stress the aspect of transition. While our lives are transitory we still live within societies that create more or less stable systems and institutions of governance. Whilst following debates in the Latvian society I have made some hypothetical assumptions about the society which has been disoriented due to wrong constitutional principles, lack of rule of law, deindustrialization and constant decrease of funds for the educational sector. The latter aspect during those economically turbulent times has literally impoverished Latvian higher education system. Thus, rather large chunk of society is hoping for divine intervention, and it vicariously underlines the figuration part in header:) The Latvian demos majority instead of taking their fate in their own hands hopes for messiah. Thus the Latvian political system suffers under the stress of post-totalitarian inertia. Europeanization of the Latvian political system has halted since Latvia joined the European Union, and the traditional pressure groups and authorities still have unduly authority, thus preventing legal rational authority to reign supreme.

The Latvian Supreme Court on November 3, 2006 ruled that during the October 2006 parliamentary elections victorious People's Party (PP) and The Latvian Way and First Party Union (LWFPU) breached the election law. The Corruption Prevention Bureau (KNAB) under the leadership of A.Loskutovs demanded both parties to pay about 2.mlj EUR (LVL1mlj PP & LVL500 000 thousand LWFPU) into state treasury. Insistence of Mr Loskutovs office appeared to be thus dangerous, that Aleksejs Loskutovs was illegally sacked in 2008. The Latvian Prosecutor's Office was meek enough, and today neither the monies are paid into treasury nor the previously mentioned parties banned. Illegality of Mr Loskutovs sacking was proven by court decision at the end of 2009, but Prime Ministers have changed twice since Mr Loskutovs was fired. While one of the former heads of the cabinet simply did not care about the state affairs, another one at least expressed his wish to see the most qualified person running for the KNAB. Nevertheless, Normunds Vilnitis with rather questionable credentials was found. Heavily indebted Mr Vilnītis (his personal liabilities amount EUR 200 000 and his wife's amount LVL 1,5mlj) is reshuffling organizational structure of KNAB, and it appears to be thus important that some odious persons attentively follow the latest news in this sensitive office. In the meantime oligarchic PP& LWLFP party organizations merged and their spin doctors are having a feast and electioneering!

Virtual dismemberment of the properly functioning legal system go hand in hand with the election campaign today. Instead of following principles of due process the same corrupt politicians continue their cynical politicking, and this is just a perfect Māris Bišofs cartoon explaining how the political kitchen of Latvia Ltd. works:)

Slesis (The former Minister of Transport Ainars Lesinskis-Slesers)
TP (tautas partija) - People's Party (PP)
LPP (latvijas pirmā partija) - Latvian First Party (FP)
PLL (par labu latviju) - For Good Latvia (movement of corrupt entrepreneurs feeding for the last 20. years on government contracts, and designed to enable PP + LWFPU to avoid paying circa 2. mlj EUR into state treasury and LEGALLY run for the parliament AGAIN)

THIS IS OUR NEW MODEL

As a consequence there is little faith left for Europeanized change in this only remaining post-totalitarian Baltic State. After the President Vaira Vike Freiberga left the office the election process of the new head of the Supreme Court, three members of the Constitutional Court, the head of the Anti-Corruption Agency and the Prosecutor General have been questionable to sound diplomatic enough. At times when the republic of Latvia experiences questioning of its very raison d'etre unqualified shenanigans are promoted for jobs in public office and there is no one to enforce the rule of law...

P.S. Here are the links to my April and May articles in the Baltic Times. For Latvian readers here is a link to my article in IR and for Estonian readers here is a link to my article in Diplomaatia.

Latvian development through the eyes of cartoonist - April 2010

2010-04-24T14:48:00.000-07:00

While Latvia prepares for the ''hot'' summer electioneering campaign prior autumn elections the mood is country is sombre or some might say even desperate. Noticed today that some smart folks in Russia used my previous blog entries for depicting the mood in Latvia with the help of cartoons. Another commentator quite revealingly concluded that there is enough said about Latvia these days. I cannot agree more... and here you have again a chosen set of fantastically revealing cartoons of Gatis Sluka.

P.S. Because my last entry I finished with the cartoon depicting the theme of roadworks decided to start this set with the same topic. Why? Because while in neighboring Baltic countries the EU funds were used to upgrade their road network Latvian former transport supremo and transport ministers before him were negligent enough, and allowed the Latvian road system to turn into permanent state of disrepair...

[Driving school] And now the toughest task ahead - getting around the potholes!

OPTIMIZATION
1. [Red house] Vocational school for road workers and next to it [greyish house]Technical school
2. [greyish house] ''Pothole fixer'' evening school

Please be so kind - I need something for sclerosis!

CRISIS STAGE

Yiddish Proverb: Don't spit into the well - you might drink from it later...AND Latvian Proverb: Do not cut the tree branch you are sitting on...
[Passer by] It seems that he can do both things at the same time!

Unemployed and destitute folks in front of the Latvian Cabinet November 2009 [GIVE US WORK!]-[Policeman] According to the City of Riga regulations you are not allowed to pitch tents in green area, and you must get rid of them!
LATER GIVE US WORK!

TRANSIT thru Latvia...

And what about me as the youngest son, what would I get? DEBTS!

CASH WITHDRAWAL/DOWN PAYMENT Man with the hat - devaluation of the lat? Other man - illegal payments?

PAREX BANK [Excuse us, but this play shall be staged behind closed curtains!]

HOSPITAL [If you were able to crawl here on your own then do not waste our time!]

[Latvian Economy] or better use ominous term Latvionomics (first designed by Morten Hansen)

[Tax-Ax in ''flesh'' of an economy] But my shadow shall stay forewer!

What are you doing? Social cushion was designed for different purpose [Dombrovskis government prepared in 2009 so called social cushion to alleviate hordes of unemployed]

[Books] How to stay an optimist? How to find a job? Be successful!

1966 - what is going to hapen with you? Astronaut!
2006 - who do you want to become to? A banker!
2010 - interesting, what is going to be your future profession? Debt collector!

[Work] You first! No, you first! Story about the extention of the unemployment benefits...

Ignorance cannot get any better...

2010-04-21T02:48:00.000-07:00

Instead of working the way out from the economic malaise the Latvian fragmented and corrupt political class continues playing reclessly dangerous games. While the trust in major institutions of representative democracy have literally evaporated, and economy stalled so called opposition politicans obstruct forming of wholesome Latvian Cabinet. After the Peoples Party (PP) left the governing coalition, it has played a nasty game. Since 2004 PP was continuously member of the government. Now the tactics of PP representatives, whose minds are poisoned with fancy and abstract models of public relations ''theories'', is to act oportunistically and blame all the wrongdoings on their former colleagues and incumbent ministers.

Yesterday it was announced that former prime minister has decided to hook up with the former transport supremo and that their campaign slogan would sound like insolvable arithmetic puzzle - (A+Š)². It is not a secret that one of the most lunatic PR specialists from agency MOOZ is behind all the ludicrous ideas of the Latvian oligarchic families. Last year the same PR ''specialist'' and his retinue achieved bad fame while organizing false campaign about fallen meteorite which allowed Latvia to circle in world media as a rather questionable state entity. It seems that former prime minister and transport supremo are resorting to all means possible, if they continue trusting lunatics, whose cynicism and smug behavior has surpassed limits of sanity.

Today, the former corrupt ministers Slesers & Skele, who became odiosly famous during Jurmalgate affair (which was partially solved and did not touch masterminds of this drab affair)), should announce their five point program to lead Latvia out from the economic malaise. The program is almost exact emulation of the program of incumbent Prime Minister Valdis Dombrovskis (what about copyright laws in LV:)). It plans to rise taxes on capital earnings, stipulate taxable amount from real estate, delegate the right to collect personal income tax to municipalities (which should create havoc in Latvian unitary state tax collecting system) and to lower VAT on ecological food... These proposals in effect are smokescreen, because whilst following the best traditions of Latvionomics (thank you Morten Hansen for inventing the new term!)(A+Š)² lunatics want to eliminate excise tax on natural gas. The latter proposal is the CRUX of the whole five point program because it vicariously explains that Latvian dependency on the Russian gas supplies is to be embedded. The latter point is contrary to the present plan of the government, who wants to have Latvia using energy mix from green energy that is abundant in Latvian rivers, forests, and bogs, and nuclear energy together with other two Baltic States.

The plans of corrupt Latvian politicians or so called AAA team are gradually becoming public. Until now corrupt former ministers have relied on lunatic PR specialists, which does not add much credibility to anything they say. In the meantime the Cabinet must find new ministers of justice, foreign affairs and health. The malaice and distrust is thus owerwhelming that nobody really wants to become minister in order not to taint ones public image, as it happened with Messrs Razans and Ronis, who were offered the positions of the minister of foreign affairs. The biggest bone of contention is the post of the minister of justice, because the criminally indicted major of Ventspils is extremely interested to save himself from justice. Last week due to Mr Lembergs instrumental behavior Janis Maizitis election for the third consecutive term as the Prosecutor General failed.

Virtual emasculation of the justice system in Latvia would be complete if the post of Prosecutor General and Minister of Justice would fall prey to the ill famous AAA team. Just to remind you that the former head of the Corruption Prevention Bureau Mr Loskutovs was toppled with the help of PP ministers back in 2007. During the same year tenure of the former prezident V. Vike Freiberga ended and under extremely questionable circumstances the incumbent president Valdis Zatlers was elected. In 2009 the new head of the Supreme Court (he nominates the Prosecutor General for the parliament to be appointed) Mr Bickovics was elected, even though journalists discovered that he had lied about the procedure of getting Latvian citizenship. Last week Prosecutor general without ANY DISCUSSIONS in the parliament was not appointed for the third term because MP's resorted to vote with closed bulletins. I am not happy with the work of Janis Maizitis, because also due to his appeasing character the Latvian state law enforcement abilities are far from functioning. However, the way the majority of MP's acted and still continue to act makes me once again realize that this prliament SHOULD HAVE BEEN SACKED LONG TIME AGO.

We are stuck with disfunctioning parliament that poisons the work of the cabinet now, however. There are almost no rational discussions in public domain, because provincial calculations among incumbent political class reign supreme. Major calculation of the present MP's is about ensuring their own enrichment, because not only tens of thousands of Latvian households but also numerous MP's took mortgage and consumer loans, and without not being elected they would have to drastically change their lucrative lifestyle. Such situation embedds the system of short term thinking and acting, and there is virtually none to start acting about long term needs of the Republic of Latvia. First and foremost, the Latvian legal and law enforcement branches are thus weak that they cannot defend interests of the public against depredations of the well organized interest groups.

It sounds pathetic, however, this situation breeds idiocy or path dependency, which does allow neither comprehensive debate nor balanced further development of Latvian society. The following five month until elections are not promising for Latvian citizenry and other inhabitamts. Until now there is no debate between righ or left wing economic policies yet, and the idiocy and ineffectiveness still reign by inertia.

P.S. As if answering my contemplations newest cartoon of
Gatis Sluka perfectly discloses mindset of an average Latvian politician and administrator...

[Street sign ] EVEN ROAD
The official: ''It will save us money! We should use such street signs exceptionally''

Election process of the Latvian Prosecutor General and political ripples

2010-04-15T03:29:00.000-07:00

This morning majority of Latvian MP's acted like clowns again. Instead of promises given by the heads of all political fractions in Latvian Saeima to vote for the incumbent Prosecutor General Janis Maizitis, this morning with 45 YEA and 47 NAY votes Janis Maizitis was not reelected for his third consecutive term. The present parliament is extremely fractional and 58 MEP's decided to vote with closed bulletins. The major culprit appears to be now the People's Party (PP) and Harmony Centre Party (HC), because differently from Union of Greens and Farmers and Latvian First and Latvian Way Party Union (LFLWU) who's members had free voting regime, PP yesterday promised to support incumbent prosecutor general.

Because the voting took place with closed bulletins it is rather impossible to discover who voted for and who against. It is useless to start investigation here because majority of the present parliament are simply crippled to perform their tasks due to intimate relations with their God-fathers... . The corrupt deals of God-fathers was supposed to untangle the same Prosecutor General who was not reelected this morning... .

According to Latvian Constitution it is the Head of the Supreme Court Mr Bickovics who nominates the name of the Prosecutor General. Mr Bickovics has not made official statements so far, but Mr Maizitis announced that he would be ready to continue his third consecutive term if he would be nominated and parliament would vote differently this time... .

Changes of election law and riddance of ill famous ''election locomotives'' that allowed about half of totally incompetent incumbent MP's to be dragged into parliament and the economic crisis has transformed the traditional political networks. It makes the political system sickly now, and it is clear that without certain further innovations in election law and the founding principles of internal revenue service Latvian democracy is insustainable. Creation of new political unions were first symptoms about remake of the Latvian political system. Today's voting officially ringed the electoral campaign in and it is essential now not only to have a new and competent prosecutor general, but also to have the stipulations in party financing law and finally pass the mandatory tax and property declaration, which is a way tooo long overdue!

The Southern Bridge follow up

2010-04-12T04:17:00.000-07:00

While reviewing most used keywords in my blog I discovered (what a surprize:) that my blog is mostly visited in order to learn about the incerdibly expensive bridge in Riga. While the Latvian State Audit Office and Mme Sudraba have appeared powerless sofar, perhaps Duncan Wood's article (Thank You Duncan!) would help to refocus Latvian prosecutors attention to real culprits of this legal and political conundrum?

Today it was announced that the building of the bridge could be terminated indefinetly. And all this regardless of the protests of the inhabitants of the nearby areas who had to learn that promises the politicians gave them would not be fulfilled.

Lets see how this Latvian conundrum would be untangled, and I only hope that this corruption case would remind Latvian electors in forthcoming elections who made decision prior the Southern Bridge was started to be built! Also I expect that politicians would not use the bridge as populist campaign slogan. There are enough issues to be disucussed and SOLVED prior October 2, 2010 elections and the comprehensive remuneration system for civil servants is one of them. The latter system of remuneration was reported by the incumbent parliament as a done deal, thus the government could report to the IMF and EU financial donors that Latvian partners have fulfilled their task. However, increasing number of Neo reports continuously remind us that in terms of orderly public finances, as much the comprehensive Latvian public service remuneration system is concerned, anarchy still ruled supreme until the very end of 2009. In addition also informative article about astounding liabilities of top notch Latvian holders of public office makes one wonder, how those politicains with their official and relatively meagre salaries plan to repay their creditors in open and transparent manner?

Unfortunately, Latvian prosecutors office cannot work at full force, because Mr Maizitis must wait until the end of the month when Latvian MP's would decide whether incumbent prosecutor general would continue in his post. Lets see what else investigative journalists would find out, and then we could also see the playground of election campaign more clearly, because until now it is simply too muddled.

P.S. Here is the link to my latest the Baltic Times article

Do Latvian people really appreciate what they get? (updated)

2010-03-11T07:07:00.000-08:00

The EU directorate of economic and financial affairs (ECOFIN) just announced, that the disbursement of EUR 0,5 billion was executed today. This disbursement of money was another part of community assistance within framework of the 7,5 billion loan that should save Latvia from insolvency. Latvian virtual bankruptcy was very much precipitated by reckless and amateurish policies of the right from centre governing coalition (People' s Party, First and Latvian Way Party Union, Union of Greens and Farmers, and Fatherland Party). The present Cabinet of Valdis Dombrovskis is the fifteenth since the Supreme Council of Latvia announced that sovereignty is reestablished within territory of the Republic of Latvia, and it is already more than five years since Latvia is a proud member of the EU. The number of disenchanted voters distrusting major institutions of government is constantly increasing in Latvia. Even more interestingly, the number of folks distrusting the EU is on the rise for last two years. Disenchantment with the governing clique is just one part of the story, but also the increase of poverty and general apathy of the electorate is gradually making Latvian Europeanization unruly. Shame on you AAA team! It is sad that the electorate (40-45% of undecided voters prior elections) has followed these false prophets thus easily so far...

Updated

And as if it is not enough Latvian ill famous AAA team has been open and active today. First, somewhat emulating FDR and his "new deal" the former PM and founder of People"s Party (PP) reached out to the rest of the society looking for social reconciliation. I should not mention all the mess his PP created throughout years (since its foundations in 1996), and Latvian public reflects its opinion about the past deeds not letting the popularity of PP to climb above the threshold needed for entering the parliament for more than two years now. The former PM finally has outlined the program for economic recovery that was long awaited, and one should only skim through the 64 slides of it to understand that there is little substance in there. And as if this would not be enough the former PM proved, that the meeting of the AAA team took place today in Riga. Are those amendments of the election law or the depth of economic contraction that made the AAA team gangsta members to coordinate their acts thus openly and hurriedly these days?

P.S. And here is my article for today's "Postimees"

Approaching elections and tectonic shifts in Latvia

2010-03-01T22:41:00.000-08:00

Prior last parliamentary elections the Union of Greens and Farmers (UGF) political union added the pocket party ''For Latvia and Ventspils'' into its fold. Major reason for such a move was the fact that the major financier of both parties is the Major of Ventspils. Such move initiated a trend of consolidation among existing political parties in Latvia. The next one to follow was the political union between the Latvian First and Latvian Way parties (LFLWP). The LFLWP in its party congress in August 2007 merged as one party to avoid possible legal consequences concerning breach of the political party campaign limits in the election law.

The Harmony Centre (HC) political union was gradually expanding its membership since last parliamentary elections. Number of smaller left to the centre parties (Social Democrats and Daugavpils City Party) have joined the major left to the centre political union so far, and HC is comfortably leading polls for a year already.

As if responding to the minuscule support that Latvian electorate has shown to the fractional political parties also Latvian Europeanized political parties have discussed possible merger into political union for a half of a year already. The Civic Union split from the New Era party in early 2008. The gradually shifting political landscape made them to reconsider the move and since Summer 2009 Prime Minister's New Era, Civic Union and Society for Different Politics have held political consultations about principles of possible merger into political union. The consultations were fruitful and on March 6 the political union ''Unity'' would be founded in Riga.

Half a month ago there were only speculations about possible political union between the People's Party and LFLWP. This morning the Minister of Regional Affairs in the LNT 900 sekundes TV program did not exclude the possibility of creating a Latvian First People's Party political union because according to Minister Zalans demand for such a union exists particularly in Latvian regions.

The elections campaign is starting in earnest, and while expecting the follow up of the ''Unity'' congress (which other political parties joining them?) I am wondering whether the proposed Latvian First People's Party political union is not another way of avoiding paying due fines into state treasury? After all, the LFLWP already created precedent of not paying about 500 000 lats into state treasury and People's Party is due to pay about LVL 1mlj. Latvian State Prosecutors should not let those two gravest examples of legal nihilism to go unattended. The principle of legal succession should still work in Latvia, does it?

New polling trends in Latvia?

2010-02-27T03:22:00.000-08:00

After rather lengthy period decided to drop some line in this blog. Reasons for my absence from this medium is my primary duty - my dissertation research. The latter proceeds accordingly and as soon I am done with the first draft I would be back & writing in this blog.

The reason for my decision to drop the line today are the latest results of the ''Latvijas Fakti(LF)'' polling firm. Already month ago the LF results were showing shifts in trend that started in the Latvian political realm since March 2007. Since March 2007, when the former president Vaira Vike Freiberga vetoed the law on security organizations and the Major of Ventspils was incarcerated, the disappearance of credibility for governing authority started to prevail in Latvian political realm. Very much due to constellation of political forces and inexperience of nascent civil society the president did not manage calling for early elections, and it only enforced the prevailing trend.

I have had quite a few colleagues who have pointed out to the fact that LF information sometimes lacks trustworthiness. I basically agree with such comments and while working with the Eurobarometer 2004-2009 biannual reports I also notices general sloppiness of LV reports in comparison with Lithuanian or Estonian ones. It is another discussion why was it so, and who are major culprits for LV Eurobarometer reports being inconsistent, but now back to the LF latest report.

The latest LF report shows continuous trend of growing support for the russophone Harmony Center party (18.5%), but the report specifically focuses on the increase of support (9.1%) for the Union of Greens and Farmers (UGF). Basic argument here is that UGF has been opposing the administrative reform of Latvian regional governments, and probably there is some grain of truth here. I am more interested on the change of prevailing trend however. And the trend of decline for almost all domestic governing institutions (government, parliament, political parties, court system) is vividly exposed in Eurobarometer 2001-2009 reports. The DnB Barometer trend also reports the decline of governing authority and embedded pessimism among the Latvian demos. But here is my figure which I updated this morning. Basically and using the LF publicly available data I have distinguished between three underlying ''forces'' in the Latvian party politics. I added the support for the governing coalition parties, the opposition parties are put together with other parties who have no representation in the parliament, and I have added also the number of undecided and alienated voters as entity of their own.

The latest two (January and February) LF reports show a positive shift in an overwhelmingly negative worldview of the Latvian public. Edward Lucas in his latest Economist article also argues about ''green shoots'' of the Latvian statecraft. Probably Latvia has hit the bottom of economic decline and the situation has initially stabilized. The Eurobarometer shows that Estonia in almost all measurements have reached the EU mean average level, and while Latvia and Lithuania are lagging behind. It somehow reminded also the speech of Vjaceslavs Dombrovskis during the Riga 2009 Conference. In his speech he drew analogies between the simultaneous group of countries of East Asia and the Baltic States (3B), while specifically pointing out that while Estonian development could turn out like South Korean one for the two Southernmost Baltic states the lot of Philippines could fall out... .

For the sake of argument I have also added some latest graphs from Eurobarometer. It is hard to predict whether the stabilization in Latvia would hold for long, because it very much depends on the present government to deliver balanced policies. However, if one analyzes the latest data on predictions about employment opportunities in their nation state, then it is possible to discover that while Estonians look optimistically forward and Lithuanians are increasingly pessimists, those are Latvians who have ''stabilized'' their formerly negative predictions.

Furthermore, the ability of government to deliver consensual and balanced policies very much depends on the ability of Latvian democratic forces to present viable economic development program that would help Latvia to climb itself out from the present pit of mismanagement. The ability of democratic forces to find consensus under the label ''Unity'' is promising and the political union would hold its founding congress in Riga on March 6, 2010. Lets wait for the congress and see whether the present stabilization would be cemented, and how the policies for reversal of deindustrialization would be laid out.

P.S. Here is the link to my latest piece in the Baltic Times (TBT).

P.P.S. For the sake of records here is the January TBT article, my latest ''Postimees'' article, and the December TBT article.

LatVasjuki boastful bluffing continues

2009-11-16T02:10:00.000-08:00

Most of Latvian experts and politicians believe that the former transport supremo boastful pronouncements are due to his wish to create informative background for his 2010 parliamentary election campaign. Today his drive to create of the informative background continues - hyperactive Vice Major of Riga believes that Latvian economy is on the verge of collapse [deg zilās ugunīs]. As a solution to the present ills, and absolutely disregarding his own mistaken decisions as a government minister and his morally corrupt behavior [even the Cardinal of the catholic Church Mr Pujāts in his party congress had to remind him about it:)], the maverick plumber alias Lešinskis believes that everyone should rush outside Latvia and search for foreign investors. In his interview he does not specify which country exactly he plans to rush, but it is not needed, because even before he openly declared here and here that Latvia's EU and NATO membership had rid Latvia from its inferiority complex, and now Latvia should openly work with his Russian chums...

Latvian plumber ready to rule "LatVasjuki"?

2009-11-14T08:39:00.000-08:00

Latvian former president and her supporters try to network support behind her nomination for the post of the European Council President next week. I honor Madam Freiberga and her team's efforts and would be happily surprised if she would manage to rally thus needed support behind her nomination for the post of the first president of the united Europe, even though I believe that more dynamic person should be needed for this newly created position.

While madam Freiberga continue her networking activities Latvian complacent and provincial politicians continue to play their games. Just in my last entry I used to mention about the zero sum game activities of the ill famous Latvian AAA team. While People's party (PP) "state capturers" are preparing for their congress in November 21, 2009 the junior member of the AAA team managed to bluff big style today.

There was annual congress of the Latvian Way Latvian First Party union (LWLFP), and also the Cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church Mr Pujāts gave his blessing for the bunch on liberoreligious bunch of the LWLFP . The Cardinal rather symbolically pleaded the conservative party folks to "abstain" from morally corrupting activities. In the meantime the former co-chairman of the party was crying foul about his correct strategy of saving Parex, and thus avoiding the Icelandic meltdown of state finances.

As if this would not be enough LETA and Apollo reports that the newly elected LWLFP party chairman and Vice Major of Riga in the party congress openly called the government of Valdis Dombrovskis to step down after the 2010 budget would be passed in the parliament. Bluffing big style is the specialty of the Vice major of Riga and rather ominously he announced that he does not want to to run for the parliament. Now, the politician with his initial surname Lešinskis, who took his wife's "europeanized" last name [Šlesere], joined other two members of the AAA team. Neither the head of the PP state capturers Šķēle nor the sponsor of the Greens and farmers Lembergs want to run for the parliament, because they deem themselves to be omnipotent PM candidates for the upcoming elections.

Latvian minigarch's spin doctors strategy is robust, but unimaginative, and now the youngest member of the AAA team wants to earn his brownies from authoritarian chums outside Latvia as well... . The political game the AAA team retinue plays is exhausting, and I still stick to the idea that this game should be left for the AAA team to immerse into. It is useless to compete with the AAA team whilst playing according to their rules, thus after the party of democratic choice would finish its consolidation it is essential to start to get our volunteers on ground and running on grass roots level as soon as possible. The October 2010 elections should turn out like "to be or not be elections" after all. Latvian civil society should avoid Latvian plumber (translation of Šlosers/Šlesers in Latvian slang) getting too snobbish in his imagined premiership of Latvasjuki, to paraphrase symbolic description of Chess capital from the Ilf & Petrov novel. Lets wait and see how the Latvian Independence Day celebrations would be held, and after them one would be able to notice whether it is mere bluffing or there is also some substance behind the verbal diarrhea of the incumbent Vice Major of Riga.

p.s. Here is access to my monthly TBT column, and the full access to it would be provided next Monday.

Latvian "minigarchs" preparing for what?

2009-11-10T21:56:00.001-08:00

Last week the Union of Greens of Farmers (UGF) announced that their PM candidate in forthcoming elections would be criminally indicted Aivars Lembergs - first A of the AAA team. Today the second A of the AAA team - odious Andris Šķēle and his gangstas [state captor's to be politically correct:)] People's Party - should reveal the messiah program for leading Latvia out from present valley of sorrow. The third A of the AAA team - the Vice Major of Riga Ainārs Šlesers - already loves to bluff in various media channels that he is definitely going to be the next PM. Regardless of all the nonsense and bluff coming from all the AAA members one theme unites them - they have no idea about the win-win sets, and the only game for them in town is the zero sum game! According to their spin doctors, whom they have entrusted their fortunes, they want rather pathetically to run for the October 2010 elections as strong leaders and the PM candidates...

Let spin doctors spend their "minigarch" resources! The democratic alternative (New Era, Society for Alternative Politics, and Civic Union) should not participate in this half crazy spin doctor imaginative dream, but provide the democratic and Europeanized alternative to the ludicrous rat race:) The democratic party union during upcoming week should come out with the new name and the consolidation process within the democratic camp is gradually evolving.

P.S. To readers who read Latvian here is just the first result of our joint research project with Axel Reetz in yesterday's CitaDiena

Latvian internet media frenzy about the possible fall of the government?

2009-10-22T11:35:00.000-07:00

The Latvian Minister of Finance Mr Einārs Repše in the KNL TV show yesterday explained reasons, why did he reprimand the head of the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) Mr Jakāns to foster structural reforms and sack civil servants with ambiguous credentials. During the TV show and in his media pronouncements today Mr Jakāns acted as if the Minister of Finance would not have been his nominal boss, and the Minister of Finance decided to temporarily sideline him from his duties today.

There have been rumours about oligarchic parties (People's Party, Union of Greens and Farmers and Latvian First and Latvian Way Party Union) engineering possible fall of the government after the 2010 budget would be passed in the parliament. These rumors materialized since the odious former PM is back in Latvian politics. Also rather uniquely the parliament did not appoint the judge Māris Vīgants as the new member of the Supreme Court (its neither caucus of judges nor the president who appoints new judges, because the parliament reigns supreme in Latvia), and several legal experts and pundits argue that the major reason for such unexpected decision was the fact that Mr Vīgants was the judge who ruled in favour of incarcerating odious Latvian minigarch Aivars Lembergs indicted in several charges ranging from corruption cases (proper explanation here should be state capture) to exceeding the power of his public office already back in 2007. The State Prosecutor's office is slowly proceeding with this massive and politically sensitive court case, thus Mr Lembergs was allowed out from the prison the same year and according to the latest information he is under house arrest, that still did not prohibit him from visiting parliament yesterday.

With all these events evolving major Latvian media channels already argue about the possible fall of the government approaching. While using the LETA as primary source, Diena, Tvnet, Apollo and Delfi discuss behind the tent discussions in the Saeima, where the gravest sin of the present government is deemed to be the minister of finance crossing the red line and sidelining a chum of the People's Party folks. The NRA is the only paper that argues the opposite, arguing "that the Minister of Finance found the best possible time to sideline the compromised head of the IRS". Neither the Latvian Radio nor LTV 1 have proven such news, and I am wondering why majority of newspaper and internet media are thus eager to spread the news about an end of the government approaching - is it cheap media frenzy or a part of whipping up the crisis expectations?

Changes brewing in Latvia

2009-10-21T13:10:00.001-07:00

Changes are brewing in Latvia that might have implications for the stability of the existing government. Already at the end of the workday the Minister of Finance Einārs Repše announced his suspicions about the head of Latvian Internal Revenue Service (IRS) being politically influenced, which is a local euphemism for an official fallen from grace and about to be sacked. Mr Repše has alarming reports from the Prosecutor General office as well as from the Corruption Prevention Bureau (KNAB). It was a public information for a while now about the financial police members who were convicted for illegal recordings of the journalist Iveta Jaunalksne telephone conversations continuing their work in the IRS. Also it was suspicious that Mr Vladimirs de Vaškevičs after being denied access from to the sensitive state secret information still became the deputy head of the IRS. The life of Mr de Vaškevičs was colourful enough, because he is owner of about hundreds of pairs of shoes (does it not remind you Ms Imelda Marcos:). Also he still continues to share the same house with his divorced wife Madam Vilkaste to save costs... . Never mind a fact, that Ms Vilkaste sold a real estate in the prime spot (Mežaparks) to the IRS for about EUR 5 million that she initially purchased for EUR 250 000, and KNAB is investigating her business practices. Also from my own sources I have heard rumours about Mr Vaškēvics (with a nickname Footballer/Futbols) being integral part of the drugs & arms shipments through the port of Riga.

In a vicarious way the announcements of the Minister of Finance proved long whirling rumours about the Latvian IRS serving the needs of the governing People's Party (PP). PP endorsed the present head of the IRS, and rumours about illegal trade on the Latvian Eastern border were politically hushed down with the help of the PP.

In the evening there was the weekly KNL show where also Minister of Finance and the head of the IRS were present. The dialogue between two officials was turning into a heated debate where the Minister of Finance very diplomatically explained why he cannot trust Mr Jakāns. While the moderator of the TV show asked whether the Minister should not consider simply sacking Mr Jakāns from his post, Mr Repše answered that such a decision is within a purview of the governing coalition.

At the end of the program the KNL moderator rhetorically asked that perhaps it would be a time finally to introduce the mandatory tax and property declaration system, thus the Latvian IRS could finally know what belongs to whom, and who is who in Latvia? Now the Latvian governing coalition has announced that the mandatory tax declaration is to be introduced from January 1, 2010. However, if the promise to introduce the mandatory tax and property declaration system is as baseless as the proposed real estate tax we perhaps would earlier see the disappearance of the Republic of Latvia. You may wonder why such an apocalyptic conclusion?

Because, even though, the governing coalition has reached a compromise on the 0,1% real estate tax after PP gangsters were convinced to support its introduction, the mechanism and administration of the new tax according to the Head of the IRS and senior civil servants is impossible earlier than somewhere at the end of next year....Is the possible sacking of the acting head of the IRS going to serve as the precursor of the fall of the existing government, because the former PM is eagerly waiting his retinue producing the momentum for his virtual coup d' entreprise?

Don't ask, don't tell

2009-10-14T22:34:00.000-07:00

Google search engine gives most answers about the ''don't ask, don't tell'' expression in relation to sexual minorities in the US army, however, it is an old expression that allowed minority groups to survive throughout world history. I do remember hearing such expressions from my grandparents in the Soviet occupied Estonia, and now also among minority groups in Latvia. In this blog entry I do not want to delve thus much back into history as to describe the present Latvian government, because in its totality Latvian nomenclature actions perfectly reveal example of "don't ask, don't tell" governance system.

Almost everyone in Latvia would answer that major culprits of the present political and economic mess in Latvia - it is ill famous AAA team. And the same AAA team catering for their own gang of supporters have institutionalised hierarchical and corrupt governance system, that is hidden behind the facade of the Latvian constitutional democracy. However, the Latvian constitutional caucus did not take place in post - independence Latvia, because the former CPSU comrades and Diaspora members simply rolled over the 1922 Satversme. Such turn of events allowed gangsters from the AAA team not only to exert inordinate influence over decision making process, but to literally capture the state.

However, it is impossible to discuss it openly on governmental level because the Prosecutor General and Corruption Prevention bureau (KNAB) are powerless so far. To present you the latest example, I believe that almost every reasonable person in the Latvian public domain understand that the government dragging its feet while implementing structural reforms was mostly due to gross mistakes of Kalvitis (PP) and Godmanis (LWLFP) governments. The previous mistakes were never really evaluated, and today we are able to learn that nothing special minister is ready to be minister again (!). Today the major opposition to structural reforms is the whimsical PP and always changing their mind UGF "coalition partners" behavior.

Disappearance of business projects and giving up of power does not happen smoothly anywhere.

The AAA team gangsters are behaving strangely however. While they were endorsing Latvian accession to the EU and NATO it allowed them to earn handsome monies from this process. I believe that they somehow miscalculated the golden straitjacket that followed the EU membership. This probably explains why the AAA team does not legalize its activities, but fights for very survival of the Lettish crony capitalism! I also have a hunch that the AAA team are not even major play makers in their shady activities, because why the hell they would act thus irrationally and gangsta like? My hunch is that they do not really manage establishing business contacts in the West, thus staying intimately connected with authoritarian chums in undemocratically governed countries. It means that Latvian Western partners must play the "don't ask, don't tell" game because alternatively there would be an open confrontation. While the civil society members were trying to explain basic principles of democratic governance to the Latvian populace, the AAA team and their retinue with their deep pockets were rather successful in disseminating their conspiracy theories. Simply the political establishment never cared establishing europeanized democratic political and discussion culture. I do understand that my last two sentences were broad generalizations, but then how to explain flourishing of such notions as sorosīdi and liberasts in Latvian public opinion? I understand if Bedlam folks use such expressions, but those notions have entered into mainstream public discourse and also Latvian politicians ostensibly use them... . I have not heard such notions in Estonia and Lithuania for example, and would be glad if someone from Eesti or Lietuva would be able to provide me facts about such occurrences.

ECOFIN Commissioner Mr Joaquin Almunia or IMF are described in internet forums as evil forces in Latvian press, but media houses and their owners who portray IMF and EU as smth. foreign could better recall that it was the Latvian political establishment (PP, UGF, LWLFP and TBLNNK) that signed agreements with both the EU and IMF. Why the hell the EU representatives must explain that Latvian government was the one requesting the mega loan and understanding the need to implement structural reforms again and again, and that the EU did not force those reforms on its own member state? Why the hell the journalists do not understand thus simple facts and participate in this "don't ask, don't tell" game? Enough for this morning, and the president convenes the state security council today, and I leave my questions unanswered. Each and every one of you probably know the reasons for present rat hole Latvian state has painted itself in. However, the government must outsmart the corrupt AAA team players, and that game is heck of the complicated because AAA team gangsters are both in government, courts and civil service, and to pinpoint who is really who in the post Soviet Latvia is not an easy task after all.

P.S. Here is my weekly column for the Baltic Times

Shaky Latvian government coalition II (updated with A. Šķēle "comeback")

2009-10-12T07:25:00.000-07:00

This morning the People's Party (PP) fuelled speculations about the fragility of the existing governing coalition. The Latvian Cabinet met today in emergency session and agreed on previously agreed budget cuts amounting LVL500 mlj. Now the Minister of Finance must present the 2010 budget for the special interest "hacking" in the Lettish Parliament. At the same time rumours have been circling for some time now about the PP, which still has the biggest representation in the parliament, engineering the fall of the government after the 2010 budget being passed in the Saeima. These rumours were partially supported by today's news announcing possible comeback (the fourth one!) of one of the most odious Latvian former prime ministers Andris Šķēle.

The news about the PP board begging Andris Šķēle to be their leader and prime minister candidate are bad enough for the government's stability. As if it would not be enough another "coalition partner" made laughingstock out of themselves today. The Union of Greens and Farmers (UGF), whose PM candidate for the forthcoming elections is no one else but the Maire of Ventspils, announced that UGF would vote against the projected school reform which would have made the Latvian schoolchildren to start the school from age six (it is seven now). What makes the laughingstock out of the UGF is the fact that the author of the reform is the Ministry of Education. The latter ministry is ruled by the UGF ministers since 2004 and also Tatjana Koķe represents the UGF. As if this ludicrous decision to undermine their own minister's work would not be enough also the Latvian Book Publishers Association announced that they would not manage printing books for the young pupils in due time. I do not understand something here, does the minister T. Koķe coordinate policy process with her party? If not, and this is exactly what the UGF announcement shows, why the head of the UDF faction in the parliament does not call for her resignation?

Updated

And while I finished this blog entry Apollo made it official, the former PM is back in politics! Some experts rightfully argued that his comeback is actually contradiction of terms, because he never actually left political string pulling. So Mr Šķēle is elected as the chairman of the PP board and it would make the Latvian political environment more than interesting the coming autumn.

Also the deputy head of the PP parliament faction Vents Armands Krauklis reiterated that PP does not support LVL500 million budget cuts, because ''they (PP) are not ready to sign hasty agreements Latvian government was forced to sign with the Western financial donors'', and the ECOFIN Commissioner is not the God Almighty''. I am watching the 100.pants TV show on LTV1 Channel and Mr Krauklis was presented the question, whether the PP agrees on LVL500 million budget cuts. Mr Krauklis answered, that they agree with the government policy now, but the PP believe that the level of budget cuts must be negotiated with the IMF because those budget cuts are detrimental to the IMF ıtself.

So far the PM Valdis Dombrovskis has not commented on the constantly changing PP position regarding the 2010 budget, just adding that the comeback of A. Skele might affect relations between political parties.

P.S. I could not resist using thus revelatory Gatis Šļūka cartoon again. The story behind the cartoon is the plan of the Military Police coordinated with Saeima officialdom to ensure security of the Lettish parliament building with the 25m security perimeter.

[Latvian MP giving command to another MP] Protesters approaching! Rise the bridge now!

Latvian shaky governing coalition

2009-10-11T22:23:00.000-07:00

Today there is a session of the Latvian Cabinet where the Minister of Finance would present cuts in the 2010 budget in order to meet the LVL 500million cut and structural reforms criteria promised to the international financial donors. This morning the deputy head of the People's Party (PP) parliamentary fraction Vents Armans Krauklis was talking in the Latvian Radio where he underlined again, that PP does not trust the chief negotiators (PM and Minister of Finance) with the IMF. Mr Krauklis very conveniently forgot that they are party of this very government he was criticizing this morning, and probably he also has bad memory, because he totally forgot who was Prime Minister from 2005-2007, and who was the Minister of Finance making Latvian politicians "famous" on Bloomberg TV. Rather boastfully he repeated again that PP is against introduction of the real estate tax, and with his traditional demagoguery juxtaposed New Era party led government to the country folks, thus trying to convince that in the government there is none to help the country people except the PP. The PP behaviour is not childish anymore and even the former president Vaira Vīķe Freiberga was vicariously pointing to that. The PP is simply destructive, but for how long?

An end of an epoch

2009-10-09T21:04:00.000-07:00

Could you imagine that the senior editor and editorial staff of either New York Times, Le Monde, Neue Züricher Zeitung, Franfurte Allgemeine Zeitung, Helsingin Sanomat, Hürriyet, or El Mundo would resign after newspaper came into hands of new owners and later be literally pushed out from premises by legal personnel? When 50% of journalists support motives of those who resigned openly with their signatures, could you imagine that your morning paper would be the same independent quality paper? If you can imagine such turn of events, then literally that is what happened in Latvia yesterday, after senior editor Nellija Ločmele and her colleagues resigned, and hang on in their webpage whilst planning to launch a new paper media channel some time in near future.

Even though "Diena" paper edition is in front of me whilst I drink my morning coffee, it is the last time I do it I am afraid. With such a massive resignation I do not believe that "Diena"could ever regain its status as a paper that proclaims liberal views of a heterogeneous world. Yesterday, they were not only quality journalists who resigned, but it was also an end of a certain post-independence epoch in Latvia. If free press is stifled, which at the present moment is only my personal hunch, then there is a short distance to the rule of "vertical of power". While following the news and seeing planned budget cuts and consequent emasculation of the Latvian public media, and now "Diena" walkout I am turning into a very, very contemplative mood about the state of democracy in Latvia... .

Present mood in Latvia through eyes of cartoonist

2009-10-06T05:48:00.000-07:00

Feelings are rather sombre in Latvia, because the winter is approaching, but the trust between the governed and government has not been really reached. Budget cuts, mismanaged economy, retired people on the verge of bare subsistence, questionably educated politicians and their policies are all reflected in those small, but thus revealing sketches. No words can describe the present situation better than poignant cartoons of Gatis Šļūka. Enjoy them, if you can:)

PENSIONER'S PIERCING

[an official] "You must understand that we all have to tighten belts now". [pensioner with a billboard HANDS OFF FROM PENSIONS] But I cannot afford the belt...

[The Latvian Cabinet] and education, culture, health care, pensions... streams trickling out...

[former PM Godmanis] Most important thing is not to get mad! ( Diena, November 11, 2008, PM Ivars Godmanis: `` we should not exaggerate (...)annual GDP could decline this year by 1,3%``("Nevajag pārspīlēt (..) IK šogad varētu samazināties par 1,3%."))

[Chef] bon appetit! [Former PM Šķēle] I better prefer a bit devalued one (abbreviation of salmon is on the one lat coin)

Milk canisters containing social, VAT, income, despair, small and other taxes. [the tax official with the gimme fast tax] where shall I stick this sucker?

[Angry farmer] Answer me! Why isn't there money in the treasury? [an official] Look, they had the fastest pay rise, get them!

[Saeima - the Lettish parliament] and several sledges in front of it (there is a rather ill ominous story from ancient times about old parents taken with a sledge to forest to die )

[Former PM Godmanis] taken the Latvian state hostage and shouting to IMF officials: "gimme the part of the loan otherwise she is gonna die"!

[official shearer] shearing "people". [another official] "There is no time to waste here, lets get wool with all the skin!"

[One MP to another] "Since the official signature campaign started (campaign of 2008 about the amendments allowing qualified number of MP's to start dissolving the parliament), I see voters in nightmares every night with a whip clutching a cart behind me like for a horse, and whipping me through the Saeima corridors...

THE FOUR YEAR CYCLE OF A LETTISH MEMBER OF PARLIAMENT

1. year - learns basics of Saeima rules

2. year - grabbing or in Latvian colloquial stealing

3. year - preparing for elections

4. year - pre-election fight

[the death] "So, you, old fart, did your minimum pension rise!" [pensioner] "No, no, I am gonna still survive this month"

[plaque - Latvian Saeima] Lettish MP: "I reckon I heard something about the insurmountable ravine between the rulers and the ruled..."

True nature of the Latvian governing coalition

2009-10-06T04:48:00.000-07:00

After all the mess what the People's Party together with their coalition buddies (Greens and Farmers, Fatherland Party and Latvian First and Latvian Way Party coalition)have done they do not even have a shame to bring their sickeningly childish games out of Latvia. Just to see the extent of coverage about the PM Valdis Dombrovskis visit to Sweden in today's Swedish press is quite something. But it is not flattering when you have to excuse for or refute sometimes rather harsh statements of the Finance Minister of a neighboring state due to absolutely irresponsible behavior of some government coalition partners.

The People's Party (PP) still has the largest representation in the Latvian literally defunct parliament, but their popularity has for the last half of the year irreversibly sunk under 2% support in the polls. After all the PP is one of the major culprits behind the stalled and continuously postponed structural reforms. Today they are following manners of true gangsters and avoid keeping their promise of introducing the real estate tax, even though they signed the document with the international lenders. There is nothing else to add here and the PP fights for their very survival, but my honest wish is to see the gangsta like PP disappearing from the Latvian political scene the sooner the better.

And here are couple of poignant & appropriate cartoons from Gatis Šļūka.

1. [coalition - orange color of PP and blue color of the New Era party]

MP with the Fatherland Party bag in his hand and piece of PP party wood in his eye pointing to the Lady [New Era party] - you have a splinter in your eye...

I am going to act irrationally if you are going to slash my salary...

Latvian parliament members are too tired to perform?

2009-10-05T22:26:00.000-07:00

Parliaments in parliamentary democracies reign supreme. Latvia is a stellar example of parliamentary democracy in its extreme form. By definition parliamentary democracy enables all parts of society to be heard, but simultaneously the system is plagued by factionalism and weak governments. Latvian situation is aggravated by the fact that after regaining independence there was no constitutional caucus, thus the Satversme of 1922 was rolled over with minor amendments into 1993. Problems of parliamentary democracy in Latvia are multiple. About the Art. 59 I already wrote in the last blog entry, but also questionable quality of MP's, who are simply not up to their tasks, aggravate problems.

Obviously, those are Latvian voters who elected such representatives, and you may ask why are voters like they are in Latvia - the most Eurosceptic (p.15-17) and amongst whom 91% (p.22) do not trust their elected representatives as Eurobarometer SPRING 2009 public opinion survey clearly outlines? First, Latvian MP's (fifth of them sit there since 1993) have disoriented Latvian voters, and it is reflected by the 30-40% of voters who traditionally do not how to vote prior elections, and also political party membership in Latvia (1% of eligible citizens) is the lowest in the whole of the EU (average 5%). Second, Latvian MP's fostered stagnation of the electoral system by keeping questionable quality of neoliberal tax policies and election law intact the last 15 years. Latvian voters trusted their elected representatives from small interest groups (they cannot be called parties in traditional sense) who either screwed their voters (People's Party, Greens and Farmers, Fatherland Party, Latvian Way and Latvian First Party Union), or who happened to be in opposition (New Era, Harmony Center, Social Democrats) and had no influence upon legislative and executive process.

The EU membership and influx of billions of euros stagnated the governance system and made MP's even more complacent. There are several actors, musicians and even the power lifting world champion who are trying to innovate the best time killing techniques possible. I do not ask Latvian President to try to resemble members of the Finnish Eduskunta who called for vote of no confidence of the existing PM due to timber used for construction of his private home, and caused calls for snap elections to the parliament, or to be as resolute as Swedish PM sacking Mona Sahlin from her post due to Toblerone chocolate and pair of stockings paid with the SAP credit card.

I do understand that for the Latvian political culture to reach the maturity of Scandinavian participatory democracy there is still some time needed. However, I am asking the president to capitalize on his raising awareness about structural problems in Latvia and use the powers entitled to him in Art. 48 of the Latvian Constitution. Legally the president of republic is the only public person who can facilitate the Latvian state exiting the present rat hole. After all, president changed his mind last week and recognized the need to overhaul the system, of how the Latvian political parties are financed. Similarly, the president could refresh his memory and think about the performance of the 9th Saeima. After all amendments into the law of security organizations that were detrimental to the very existence of the democratic republic (2006) were made for someone, the loss of confidence in the Kalvitis government (2007) & Godmanis government (2009) did not fall from empty sky, faulty amendments in criminal law allowing to continue money launderers to thrive were passed for someone, failure to bring about rational constitutional changes during the summer of 2008 were meant to guard the structure of the inefficient system intact, and inability to pass the budget in due time every year is a chronic disease of Lettish parliament already. The list is pretty long already, and if its is not enough, then a year prior the end of their tenure (!) Latvian MP's have passed the legislature entitling those MP's who would not get into the next parliament with hefty compensations. After all the Republic of Latvia is officially called neither monarchy nor oligarchic republic, with entitlements being met just because you are member of the parliament! To paraphrase the old fairytale about the king who was fond of extravagant dress the Saeima is reigning supreme in Latvia while wearing exotic garbs, and only the biggest fool would not notice that in reality the sovereign is not wearing a garb at all and it is absolutely naked... .

P.S. And for those reading Latvian, here are my first and second blog entry in "Diena", and for Estonian readers here is my opinion for ERR.

Slow takeoff of structural reforms in Latvia

2009-09-30T00:49:00.000-07:00

The need to overhaul Latvia´s outdated political, administrative and economic system is long overdue. The EU membership, instead of capitalizing on reforms that could have put Latvian governance system on path of sustainability, led the Latvian political system into the abyss of corruption (head of the Anti Corruption Office announced that it is becoming more subtle) and economic stagnation. The task of PM is titanic and instead of helping to steer the broken governing machine out of the recession coalition partners continue their backstabbing games.

Yesterday, Latvian Cabinet after long wranglings finally agreed (it had to present the same plan already for the May 15, 2009 deadline!) on the universal remuneration system for all the state employees. The new remuneration system stipulates that the highest paid state official henceforth would be the president of the republic, but the governor of the Bank of Latvia (BoL) and the Head of the Financial Capital and Market Commission (FCMC) were left out of the new system due to insistence from the European Central Bank and EU Commission.

While the governor of BoL has agreed to keep solidarity with the rest of the civil servants and to lover his salary, the head of the Latvian FCMC still receives her EUR10 thousand monthly salary. And all this after her odious pronouncements, and absolute inactivity to guard taxpayers interests after crash of the Parex bank, which now undermines already shaky stability of the Latvian Cabinet. The State Audit should publish its official evaluation of the Parex Affair tomorrow, but it already has made Prime minister and prosecutor general their statements made.

While some civil servants in Latvia are busy working on structural reforms other public persons are sinking deeper in their debts. The structural reform process is one hell of a haphazard process in Latvia. Without any discussions now the kids would start attending school at the age of six. Alright, then the government discussed all summer about the plans to emulate a good example of merging Competition Council with the Major Regulator in neighboring Estonia. Latvian Cabinet motley coalition yesterday started their obstructing games, and the whole process of merging those two institutions failed, even though it is long known that the head of the Latvian Regulatory Agency Ms Andrejeva is gambling addict , even though she believes that it is her hobby, and in addition her name is found also in the ill famous list of indebted officials....

The new system of public officials remuneration is a very wise move in a right direction, even though Roberts Zile (MEP) argued that such systems exist only in autocratic countries... .The reform process is too strained and inconsistent due to Latvian constitutional shortcomings (Art. 59). The previously mentioned article makes the PM constantly worry about the stability of the coalition government, because replacement of any minister needs approval in the parliament. Thus, in the Latvian present circumstances where parliament was illegitimately elected and PM cannot devote his full time to structural reforms there is no better and democratic cure than snap elections. This question is on agenda of the president however, because according to Latvian constitution he is the only power who can call for early elections. Involvement of former and present ministers and public officials in openly shady or quasi shady deals tarnish the honest members of the Latvian government. Thus, all in all, the whole Latvian governance system makes me to recall an old Turkish proverb about a person moving one step forward and two steps back...

The Latvian Potemkin village

2009-08-30T21:49:00.000-07:00

Yesterday habitually followed election results in Japan and Germany in order to keep me up to date with political events in world's leading export led economies. Results from the three German Länder (Sachsen, Thüringen and Saarland), except somewhat unexpectedly good results of Oscar Lafontaine and his Left Alliance, were predictable and gave a signal about the possible end of the German present grand coalition after federal elections at the end of the September 2009. The crashing end of the half a century rule of liberal democrats in Japan, however, was rather significant and bears several similarities with the present political situation in Latvia. The Liberal democratic party (LibDem) was a roof organization for several political groupings that kept together the conservative party of power. It was done in rather peculiar way and corruption scandals were a constant phenomenon in the country of rising sun. The LibDem party of power could manage their affairs well during the Cold War era, when Japanese economy booming, but the end of the Cold War and the rise of Chinese rival set in new realities for the Japanese policy makers. Basically the victory of Japanese Democratic party emulates events in South Korea back in 2000. The vigilance of the S-Korean civil society resulted in the black list of corrupt politicians and pushed a way for democratic reforms in the political culture of South Korea.

The vigilance of the Latvian civil society is constantly tested by new disclosures. The magnitude and number of abuse of power is thus great that sometimes there is a feeling that the civil society has given up on prudent change in Latvia. It is ominous that new political parties are crystallising out of the present political mess. Within liberal circles and some utterly base politicians (Aivars Lembers, Mareks Seglins) show their contempt for new political formations, but I am sure that they really do not UDERSTAND, how representative democracy should work for country to stay sustainable at the end! Politicians and top notch civil servants disdain for the rule of law is omnipresent and I would write about the role and peculiarities of Latvian burgeoned civil service in one of my next blog entries.

At the same time the Latvian Potemkin village continues to survive. The name Potemkin village dates back to the end of the 18th century, when the Russian autocrat Catherine II was fooled during the Russian military campaigns in Crimea by her trusted underlings in order to boost their rankings in the royal entourage. Similar attitude of traditional rule just in a more robust way are performed in Latvia today. Just Latvian politicians and top notch civil servants do not have to build ghost villages, but have to pretend that behind the walls of nicely painted Riga ministries and agencies there is a real policy making going on while in reality they participate in the reality show.

The present system is actually very simple. Contrary to numerous World Bank, European Commission and IMF recommendations the leaders of traditional parties, agencies, local municipalities and ministries (ill famous nomenclature) traditionally keep receiving hefty sums in bonuses and other means of gratitude while keeping the rest of the civil service on "diet" while sometimes throwing some "glittery chunk" (ill famous end of the year bonuses) to some of them. This traditional system kept perpetuating itself and now with the economic bubble burst the members of the nomenclature cannot agree on traditional rules of the game because there is not enough financial means. Some critique could remind me that the present 7,5 billion euro mega loan would be also squandered among the hungry Latvian cleptocrats as my colleague Janis Berziņš calls them. Yea, possibly so and only history would tell us how the money was spent, and that history would speak pretty soon, because Latvian political landscape is being reconfigured right at this moment.

At the end there is mush to do in order to turn the Latvian Potemkin ministries and agencies (please forgive me the generalization, because I know that rather many civil servants are devoted and patriotic working bees regardless of their incompetent and morally corrupt bosses) to work like the units of public administration. The process of overhauling the work of traditional nomenclature is not easy, and I am afraid that there is know-how and counter-balancing help from Brussels corridors needed. Simply the Latvian Satversme (constitutution) is the hybrid of the Weimar defunct Konstitution and the third branch of government - the legal one does not help us much here. Yesterday, the TV3 station weekend program investigative journalists continued to search for truth of the way, how the head of the Latvian Supreme Court Ivars Bičkovičs got his Latvian citizenship. According to the TV3 and other media channels today, the administrative procedures were not followed, archival documents have miraculously perished, and granting Latvian citizenship to the present head of the Latvian Supreme Court was illegal!

After such allegations interesting political repercussions should follow. Either the present head of the Supreme Court should step down (be fired by the parliamentary vote) or the former head of the Naturalization department Madam Eiženija Aldermane must change her announcements now. It is very important, because the head of the Supreme Court is the official who would have to announce the nomination for the new Prosecutor General in couple of month time. Another political scandal is gradually being formed, huh, uhh...

The Baltic Way 20th anniversary - post factum

2009-08-24T12:47:00.000-07:00

The 20th Anniversary is happily over. Thanks to the organizers, volunteers , and orienteering enthusiasts in all the three Baltic States this rather sporty anniversary was a success. Unusually hyperactive Latvian electronic media channels were somewhat overflown with nationalistic utterances and thus the whole anniversary reminded me of the PR campaign for certain political class/es in Latvia. Throughout the August 23 the Latvian electronic media was reminding that there are about 15 000 registered participants from Latvia, while in Estonia there are 5000 and in Lithuania 3000 only. At the end corrections of participation numbers "made" Estonians into laggards of the Baltic Way 20th anniversary participation and Latvians came out as winners with about 50 000 participation rate and leaving Lithuanians in the middle. I felt that these constant reminders about high rates of Latvian participation somehow overshadowed very good speeches of Mr Toomas Hendrik Ilves in Tallinn and Ms Dalia Gribauskaite in Vilnius.

I ran my couple of kilometers in Ķekava (411 km of the Baltic Way), and rather expected, the feeling on the Baltic Way 2009 was emotionally and qualitatively different from the one in 1989 which I had near Tallinn. Sportsmanship was there and I saw several sports teams and families with their offsprings spending their Sunday commemorating the paramount summit of the Baltic unity that rather ironically commemorates one of the nastiest secret deals of realpolitik (Ribbentrop - Molotov Pact).

However, I was missing the feeling of Baltic unity. It is a fragile concept this Baltic unity, because its existence came about more like an historic paradox. And it was not missing just because Estonia and Lithuana in Latvia sounded just as a point of reference for the event commemorating the historic event, when about 3 million Estonians, Latvians and Lithuanians joined their hands in defiance of the Soviet empire of evil and so reminding the world that injustice of August 23, 1939 and subsequent June 16/18, 1940 would be undone one day. I missed the feeling also because I believe that the present governors of Latvia do not deserve neither to commemorate nor celebrate this event. First, they have miserably failed doing all the necessary homework required to enable sustainable governance of their represented nation state. Second, their complacent behaviour is far from over, because former ministers and present MP's still dare to speak out like boorish politicians from the state that just learns to coexist in the family of nation states. As a proof here you have just a quick excerpt from an interview of the worst Latvian minister of finance (Atis Slakteris) given to the July 2009 number of O KLUBS.

Q: What makes you to enjoy politics, why aren't you the simple Atis, who works on his farm?

A: (Waits for rather long time) "All in all I am still the simple Atis. (while laughing) I came to politics gradually, because I never aspired to be in politics. But I became a minister because I had mobile telephone (!transl. note), which I had because I bought a used one for 800 USD, and it had an antennae - like a big whip. You see, people could reach me, and so I became a member in the first Šķēle government."

Those are the former ministers who still kill their time shamelessly in the Latvian parliament that is habitually in recess when the worst economic crisis has hit Latvia. Politicians like the official court jester of Latvian Saeima Juris Dobelis happened to run with his family, and rather positively he did not start his filibustering diatribes on the route. Other politicians still believe that that they can continue their short term back stabbing policies and they believe that their mishaps are possible to undo with the help of some money and effective PR campaign. Probably, just like some of them did also during the 20th Anniversary of the Baltic Way celebrations. Anyway, end is good and all is good. Some 50 000 Latvian active citizens were shaken up from their daily routine and probably made to think also about how atomized the Latvian society is today. I hope that at least some of them thought about it prior the economically harsh autumn and winter sets in. Freedom, accountable political class, and rule of law does not land from heaven, those virtues must be won first and what is as important - those virtues must ensure continuation of the domestic checks and balances system that would enable the vigilant civil society to enjoy comfort of the commonwealth continuously.

P.S. Also Gatis Šļūka has added his poignant view on the Baltic Way 2009

Text in Latvian: EST & LIT talking about LAT: "She is absolutely sick! Should move farther away in order to not to get infected"

The 20th Anniversary of Baltic Way on threshold

2009-08-21T13:05:00.000-07:00

I am about to return to the shores of the Baltic Sea tomorrow after having a very productive summer. The 20th Anniversary of the Baltic Way is under way, and I am going to participate together with my family in quite few of the events taking place throughout Eesti, Latvija and Lietuva. This entry is just a small reminder about my return from paradise into civilization. Concise updates on Baltic politics would definitely resume in September, because the coming autumn appears to be rather tough both for the Latvian people and leaders. Lithuanian and Estonian economies are surviving, and lets see how quickly the trend in the EU's biggest economies of slow coming out of the global recession would arrive to the Eastern shores of the Baltic Sea.

P.S. At the same time I am adding a piece that was commissioned by the Baltic Times and appeared in August 13, 2009 issue. For those reading Latvian there was a piece that appeared in Diena in early August.

Governing coalition and summer negotiations

2009-07-25T04:01:00.000-07:00

I returned from the coast of Aegean for a week to do dissertation interviews and participate at the RSU entrance exams. It is summer time in the Baltic States but all the three governments must cope with the economic recession. All three governments must drastically cut government expenses and curb top notch civil servants and politician´s salaries. While Lithuanian and Estonian governments have managed doing painful education, home affairs and civil service sector reforms Latvian government must do those long overdue reforms now all at once. It is a gigantic task and in addition Latvian second biggest Parex bank requires monies for stabilizing its operations.

Travails of Valdis Dombrovskis (Latvian PM) have barely started but the governing coalition members already show their true nature. Instead of fixing problems that the very coalition ``partners`` created during their rule from 2004-2009, the same coalition members are playing traditional ``Latvian political stabbing games`` now. Instead of listening to the Western partners advice (Latvia is a member of the EU and NATO after all) some of the Latvian provincial and boorish politicans want to continue serving their special interests.

The IMF was chosen as a chief negotiator to overhaul Latvian overblown and antiquated public service sector. The statutes of the European Treaty does not allow the European Commission to meddle into the internal affairs of its member states while bypassing the European Council. That was the reason why, even though the biggest creditor of the 7,5 billion euro loan is the European Union, the structural reforms negotiations are steered by the IMF. While the first to tranches of the multi billion loan is already transferred into the Latvian treasury, now two Latvian governing coalition members (Union of Farmers and Greens (UGF), and People´s Party (PP)) are calling the government to pause or even to give up the loan from the IMF in order to avoid harsh conditionality of the IMF and EU requirements.

The situation is serious enough thus the president interrupted his vacation. While the Latvian executive is still working the Latvian lawmaker is in recess till the end of August. And the latter is the biggest cause for insurmountable problems in this tiny parliamentary republic. Also the governor of the Bank of Latvia called the announcements of some of the governing elite members as irresponsible, but its seems that it is not enough. It was announced that tomorrow there would meeting of the coalition council in Riga. Major topic? Future negotiations strategy with the IMF!

While the Ministry of Economics has structurally reformed already and serves as an example for other Latvian ministries to emulate, the rest of Latvian civil service is still in waiting mood, and irresponsible announcements of Augusts Brigmanis (UGF) and Mr Kucinskis (PP) are only prolonging the irresponsible stalemate. When the Dombrovskis took the reins of the government then it was announced that by May 15, 2009 Latvian civil service would have a comprehensive public service remuneration system, but civil servants at the ministry of Finance still have failed to deliver (and when the remunaration system would be introduced then?). While New Era party is holding the reins of power still certain ministers drag their feet and sometimes obstruct the reform process. Instead of solving the problems in a transparent way Latvian executive continues its traditional ways of secrecy. For example, the government without any discussions and listening to doctors or social workers opinion has agreed to give in to the alcohol producers lobby (the minister of Agriculture Mr Duklavs (UGF) was the manager of Piebalgas Alus brewery), and they want to start selling alcohol at night again (now all sale of alcohol is prohibited from 10pm - 10am). The former transport supremo has changed his profile and he is the vice Maire of Riga now. His political announcements are shady however, and its seems that he has left several political land mines behind him.

The fact that some of the governing coalition members want to terminate negotiations with the IMF is simply stupid and shows short - sightedness of those politicians who dare to make such announcements. Also it makes me feel that something is brewing in the governing circles. The latest ratings show that except the Harmony Center party all other Latvian parties have lost legitimacy in the eyes of Latvian voters. Probably some of the parties who have come up with controversial announcements about the termination of the negotiations with the IMF hope for some brownies and early elections. Juris Dobelis (Fatherland Party-MP) in his latest interview uttered that he does not believe the present parliament would be able to survive until the October 2010 elections. The snap elections cannot come from the clear sky, however, and need a legitimate cause for the president to use his powers entitled upon him. I would not be surprised if May 26, 2009 meeting would end in disaster, that would make the president to call for sacking the utterly inefficient parliament. According to Latvian constitution the referendum would be called then in two months where presidents might come out either as a Latvian history maker or as a loser.

Why do I think this way? Because if the early parliamentary elections would take as early as possible then PP, UGF and Fatherland parties have still something to gain. The more time goes by the more legitimacy the Harmony Center and Latvian First and Latvian Party Union (LFLWPU) would gain and more control over administrative resources acquire. Also earlier elections the better for government parties, because it would not be easy for the Harmony Center and LFLWPU to find viable candidates for the parliament, and Ainars Slesers would find it hard to justify his decision to run for the parliament again.

Early elections would also prevent the rapid consolidation of the reformist Latvian parties - New Era, Civic Union and Society for Another Politics, although that process proceeds slowly now. Anyway, I have always kept repeating that I do support early elections due to many reasons. First, the elections in October 2006 were not truly legitimate and it also created historic precedent by the decision of the Supreme Court as of November 3, 2006. Second, in the parliamentary republic the travails of lawmakers are supreme, but while Latvia experiences worst economic decline in its history parliamentarians are simply in recess now. Third, most of the MP`s are simply unqualified and are simply killing their time in order to meet their mortgage payments. Finally, I believe that legitimacy of the rulers can be restored only by punishing perpetrators who allowed Latvian state to be led into its present abyss. And even if Latvian lawmakers did not participate in shady deals, their major guilt is the fact that their incapacity to rule was a major cause for lack of oversight over Latvian regulatory agencies and outright legal loopholes that allowed chosen interest groups instead of public to reign supremely for the last eighteen years. There is no better punishment for the present MP´s than early elections.

After elections (updated)

2009-06-07T14:38:00.000-07:00

Life will go on after elections even though I was not elected in the European parliament this time. Many thanks to all he supporters and people who endorsed me. Its midnight and I have to catch up with certain tasks being delayed due to the elections campaign. Estonian daily asked opinion piece about the EP & municipal elections in Latvia, and tomorrow I would follow with my own reflections in English.

Updated

I did not have time to write my evaluation of election results yet. There is certain post-election blues feeling in Latvia and latest announcements of the government are not encouraging at all! First, the Prime Minister came with an announcement about budget cuts (Ls506 400 000 in 2009, and about the same sums also in 2010, 2011, 2012!!!!) day after elections, thus deservedly earning ranting of traditionally reserved former president Vaira Vike Freiberga. Second, the Minister of Finance contrary to his and his party´s earlier announcements came out with a scandalous announcement yesterday about plans to abolish the mandatory income declaration system for Latvian politicians as it exists now! This news was immediately picked up by the Diena columnist Pauls Raudseps. He concluded that if the government cannot implements the system of financial control over the expenses of officials now, when the PM overlooks the work of Corruption Prevention bureau (KNAB) and the Minister of Finance oversees the work of Latvian Revenues Service, then when would they?

The latter news make me sad but in the meantime relieved about my decision last year to leave ranks of ``New Era`` party. How unfortunate news these are, but I still hope that the proposed consultations among New Era, Civic Union and Society for Different Politics would bear some fruit, and we could be united prior upcoming parliamentary elections. Until then there will be a lot of consultations and trying to downplay unusually high self-esteems of some Latvian politicians. Political environment in Latvian could be characterized as middle class anarchy now, and Gatis Sluka had a similar view on the present situation:)

Text in Latvian: ``Everything is gonna be alright!``

Latvian traditional voters expecting their mesiah coming?

2009-06-05T07:25:00.001-07:00

Tomorrow there are the European Parliament and municipal elections in Latvia. During the election campaign I witnessed rather many people who expected new mesiah coming. Indeed, and also Gatis Šļūka had a similar feeling for the upcoming voting:)

Text in Latvian:

There are only idiots in the goverment! When are we going to see new persons there?

I am going to run for the office! What, are you an idiot?

The Lobby

2009-06-04T00:39:00.001-07:00

The Lobby

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Ten thousand teachers, really? (updated)

2009-05-20T07:27:00.000-07:00

While government wants to bring about the change Latvian teachers, policemen, professors and the rest of public sector workers wait for news about the planned layoffs. From one ministry I heard confirmation about fifty employees sacked in ten minutes, but it was relatively small one. Huge layoffs should be expected in the most numerous ministries - interior, education, agriculture and finance. While civil servants wait and government work is almost frozen news just came about ten thousand teachers or one third of all Latvian teachers to be laid off by September 1, 2009. This is extreme news, and I would update on this news as soon as I would comprehend this number in comparative terms. Until then the Latvian public must simply survive the increasing rate of unemployment that ratcheted up in the first quarter to the 13,9 % annual rate, because otherwise Zemgus cartoon could turn out to be prophetic.

Text in Latvian: Lowest point of decline is being reached & got to climb up now!

Updated

Numbers I have had hold on are not reliable yet, but political developments have taken their own path. The Minister of Education and former undersecretary of the Ministry Mrs Tatjana Koke just sacked the incumbent undersecretary Mr Mareks Gruskevics.

Wage cuts and economic slump

2009-05-16T07:38:00.000-07:00

Just a small Gatis Šļūka cartoon for a weekend:-)

Text in Latvian: [Plaque on the wall -Saeima - Latvian Parliament] To save more money they all relocated to one of the closed mental asylums.

Latvian politicians only want to fill their pockets so far

2009-05-08T00:51:00.000-07:00

The Republic of Latvia is experiencing the worst economic crisis. Almost half a year the topic of devaluation has whirled in academic circles and media. There is consensus that slimming of the burgeoning red tape and cutting wages by 50% would serve as an alternative form of devaluation. In the meantime odious former prime minister openly questioned ability of the present government and the Bank of Latvia (BoL) to contain the economic crisis, and speculated after the need to devalue the national currency - the lat.

Today the governor of BoL Mr Ilmārs Rimšēvics openly confronted the former PM and concluded that the irresponsible calls for devaluation are due to the fact that former politician wants to earn money on devaluation! It is the first time when the high ranking official in Latvia indirectly questions moral standards and wish of someone from officialdome to earn money from manipulating the state economy for his private profit. Would there be additional brave revelations similar to Mr Rimšēvics?

Latvia transforming

2009-04-26T21:29:00.000-07:00

I have kept quiet for the most of April due to couple of projects to be finished, work at the university and forthcoming European Parliament elections. In the meantime Latvian government is trying to transform sectors of education and health care now. Last Thursday president Zatlers convened a closed government meeting and inquired about the pace of structural reforms. Presentations of the Ministers Koķe and Eglītis convinced the president Zatlers that the structural reforms have taken off from the absolute zero. By May 15 the comprehensive system of civil service remuneration system should be finally introduced in Latvia after eighteen long years.

It is hard to follow all the events because the whole state governance system is forced to transform now. In meantime there are many unknowns due to expected massive layoffs. By the end of the years there is a plan to lay off about 4000 teachers and cut the number of hospitals by half (from 56 to about 23). The reality is harsh and long postponed reforms have to be managed all at once in Latvia now. Scenarios about the future range from apocalyptic visions of Ivars Ījabs to moderate assessments of Latvia coping with the existing crisis for the next twenty years. Latvia is transforming and to paraphrase young people of the late 1980's from the Juris Podnieks movie "Is it easy to be a young person?" ("Vai viegli būt jaunam") one may conclude that it is not easy to be a Latvian citizen in 2009.

Eighteen years...(updated)

2009-04-07T13:09:00.000-07:00

The life in Latvia slowly wakes up from its "winter slumber". There should not have been time for a cozy sleep, but the previous governments lulled the state administrators and civil society into the artificial dream balloon. Now the newly formed Valdis Dombrovskis government must puncture that balloon in order to replace the engine on Latvia Inc. As a good friend after my presentation about the Latvian political and economic situation in Tallinn quite ominously uttered: "it does not really pay to replace broken parts of Latvian combustion engine anymore, it must be simply replaced with a brand new diesel..."

Latvian new engine must be created or to put it differently, Latvian education, police and health care sectors must be utterly transformed in order the Latvian State Treasury would be eligible to receive the next tranche from the IMF [in medium term it inevitably would require constitutional overhaul]. It is rather late already, and I will update this blog entry tomorrow morning. Until then enjoy another Gatis Šļūka excellent view on [Eighteen years of the Latvian economy]. For those of you not familiar with Latvian traffic signs it is a stylised version of the dead end.

Updated

It is Wednesday morning and today Saeima must pass constitutional amendments in Art. 78 and 79 in final third reading, thus giving 1/10 of the electorate a right to initiate early elections. Latvian PM Dombrovskis just gave a very concise interview on Latvian radio, where he explained that the government simply cannot afford to back off from plans to overhaul the economy. The strategy for the budget making, that should be accepted somewhere in the early June, is to bring the government expenses down to the 2006 level, good. Valdis Dombrovskis must clean up the mess of previous and very complacent "apparatchiks", and while there is some whining here and there the overall comprehension among the majority in society hopefully is - you reform or you die!

Reforms are piecemeal so far and communication between the government and IMF is secretive. While the Minister of Health Mr Eglītis (People's Party) announced that he disagrees with the proposed budget cuts in health care system PM disagreed with him, thus Mr Eglītis must figure out how to overhaul the system of health care after all. The same is expected from the Minister of Education and Science Mrs Koķe (Union of Greens & Farmers). Sending her own employees from the ministry to participate in the Teachers Trade Union organized march was not the most brilliant idea. New ideas for overhauling the relic of Soviet past, stagnant and ineffective system of education are required from Madam Koķe, does she & her party have them, if they do not even have a real candidacy for Maire's post for the upcoming municipal elections?

Required administrative reforms are very well showing other bottlenecks in Latvian governance system. Hopefully the early spring endogenous reforms will brake a way in for a new generation coming into the Latvian political field. The spring weather is promising so far.

P.S. And while Latvian government has to overhaul their economy with the means possible Estonians are recalling the role of Finnish YLE to provide the cultured elites of Estonia during the Soviet occupation. There is documentary released about the same phenomenon that is so often brought up in discussions, when Latvian and Estonian economies & societies are compared these days.

P.P.S. Those of you reading Latvian here is my piece I wrote for Diena on April 2, 2009

Latvian slow motion reality continues

2009-03-31T12:01:00.000-07:00

Yes, Valdis Zatlers had his speech which he left for history to judge. As it was already predicted by the very pollster on the right side of this page and also some pundits, it was inconsequential and full of contradictions! In slow motion he reminded examples of misuse of power by "the former governing class" that led to the riots on Riga streets in January 13, 2009, but gave no personal evaluation of those events. Instead of pinpointing what kind of compromises were achieved to move on from the present fragile stability president had really nothing else to offer except, "God bless Latvia" ("Dievs svētī Latviju"). Indeed, Valdis Zatlers acknowledged that most of the requirements from the list of his January 14 speech have been met. Thus, I translated major points that were brought up by Mr Zatlers and added my own comments:

1) "new coalition government is working with the 2/3 support in the parliament [but he acknowledged earlier in his speech that the parliament is supported by 4% of the population only, thus I should ask Mr Zatlers team - where is speech writer's common sense???]. Government enjoys higher level of trust (!) compared to the previous government [reaching the same scanty 17%, common, do not turn yourselves into laughingstock]. It is very important for passing decisions that are unpopular but required;
2) Latvian electoral law is amended and the so called "electoral locomotives" would not help MP's with questionable qualities coming into the parliament. In addition legislation preventing organized crime is finally incorporated into the Criminal Code;
3) parliament finally accepted [but the procedure to choose the new head was utterly murky, although politicians agreed on following transparent and understandable rules of the game] the new head of the Corruption Prevention Bureau (KNAB);
4) plan for stimulating economy [there are numerous plans in Latvia, but what is lacking is political will to implement them in their fullness] is accepted in the government and the state administration reform was started. Remuneration caps were established for state and municipal employees, and also most of the state company politicized boards were liquidated;

5) The parliamentary commission that oversees the use of international financial aid has also included independent financial experts, members of State Audit Office, the Bank of Latvia and other institution members. This commission must make sure that the borrowed billions in loans would be used legally and efficiently [I really would like to see that!].

6) Constitutional amendments proposed in the referendum of August 2008 which provided for a qualified number of electorate to initiate the process of early elections were finally passed in the second reading of the Parliament a week ago. The parliamentary majority plans to pass these amendments in the final third reading on April 8, 2009."

President Zatlers called for the unity and asked people to associate ourselves with "our" not "that" state. Such appeal sounded more of a cheap rhetoric, because while the problems were brewing from 2004-2008 the same politicians who elected the President Zatlers called members of civil society as mere canines [kvaukšķi]. It is ironic that now, when taxpayers monies are wasted in the former governments mismanaged casino economy, the President is forced to ask for reconciliation among the political classes in Latvia. President appealed to government and the parliament: first, that negotiations with the IMF should be finalized properly, second, structured help of Latvian businesses, third, that minimum social welfare programs should be implemented when times turn out really harsh, and finally, the political climate should be changed in Latvia.

The last appeal sounded extremely ironic, and I must repeat what I already said before: how come you may achieve the rape victim trusting her/his rapist again? For reconciliation to happen after the People's Party, First/Latvian Way Party Union & Union of Greens and Farmers massively transgressed the law, time would be needed. Early elections would have been the the most appropriate and orderly way to try to heal the wounds, that the former/present governing elite tore into the Latvian body politics, but it seems that the Latvian presidential family was not ready enough for such a development yet.

Regardless of latest political achievements the stability in Latvia is very fragile. TV3 hostess Baiba Sipeniece correctly pinpointed that the saddest part of the whole presidential memorandum saga is due to the fact, that Latvian present political "elite" endemically does not know to manage routine policy implementation process. Unless there is no stick, they are not prone to move their backs, and when there are presidential memorandums they cry out foul about president being authoritarian who delivers ultimatums.

The problem is, however, that the special breed of post-Soviet politicians was designed for such behaviour, because they are used to work under traditional authority (hence the almost 23% of Latvian electorate craving for dictatorship) only. Until traditional authority (ill famous AAA team) would continue to spread its influence I do not foresee substantial improvement in Latvian administrative capacity. Two issues should be on the top of the agenda now for the Latvian parliament - the mandatory tax declaration system, and amendments in electoral law, thus finally political parties would be financed from the state budget! Without those two laws minigarchic families would continue to have their inordinate influence and consolidation of the Latvian political society would not take place.

At the end Zemgus in today's Diena already foresaw the outcome of the speech. It is the final day of March, and the next deadline is the June 6, when municipal and European Parliament elections should take place in Latvia.

Text in Latvian: Latvian PM Dombrovskis, Minister of Finance Repše holding on & President ["I will not pull the hand brake, because..."]

Quick exit from the sinking ship???

2009-03-30T10:25:00.000-07:00

Little by little former political elite members leave their warm places. After resignation of Ivars Godmanis some politicians smoothly retired into the parliament and the two most controversial ones among them. Today Delfi reports that the former head of Latvian border guards Mr Āboliņš "handed" over his letter of resignation to the Minister of Interior. Tomorrow Latvian president must have an announcement about his self-imposed memorandum to the Latvian present political elite. Until the announcement tomorrow at CET 8 pm, and apparently even after the ominous speech, the Latvian political culture should remain puzzling. Day after tomorrow after climbing half way to Everest, tenure of the worst Latvian politician of all times should finally run out.

While some former politicians are forced to retreat, and some others plan to return or rejuvenate [there were two new parties formed last weekend in Latvia - New Latvia & Libertas Latvija], the government of Valdis Dombrovskis tries hard to keep the half sinking Latvia Ltd. afloat. While the Prime Minister and Minister of Finance are hard working and apparently with best intentions I do not believe that it is enough. Magic wands wont work here and the sluggish Latvian Saeima [parliament] serves as a drag on the country's further development. Resignation of Mr Āboliņš is only the tip of the iceberg, because the real "berg" is the multitude of mostly pre-pension age nomenclature members, who serve as shackles for the Republic of Latvia freeing itself from the stagnated and sometimes corrupt networks of closely knit cells of people.

Until the members of parliament and complacent politicians in the state company boards wont learn the lesson that transgressing the law brings punishment, there will be no substantial way out from the present economic meltdown. For civil society trusting the present government there needs to be the possibility to start punishing the People's and Latvian First/Latvian Way union parties for transgressing law, and thus to start from a clean sheet. For that, there is no better mechanism designed in most of industrially developed West than snap elections. For years Latvian politicians have tried to develop "their own bicycle", as the old proverb says in Latvian, while Latvia's Southern and Northern neighbors have relied on emulating the best examples of EU governance. If the current economic and political crisis does not ring the wake up call for the old political class and the President, especially in a time when 65% of Latvian population would happily see the present parliament being sacked, then what would??? About 63,9% of Latvian young people are ready to leave the country permanently, thus I would like to ask: Mr Zatlers do you want Latvia to turn into a home for the elderly?

Text in Latvian: [driver] Hop in! We are taking the same route! [Latvian cyclist] No! Can do it myself!

Cartoon: Gatis Šļūka

Adieu...water sports?

2009-03-27T02:28:00.000-07:00

Latvian public was rather agitated when the former PM announced that he is quitting Latvian politics on a rather ominous date. He is probably the least loved politician after Latvia regained its independence in the early 1990's, and most of the folks in this Baltic State can sigh in relief now. Customarily to the special breed of the post Soviet politicians former PM does not want to get too far away from the taxpayers monies, thus he plans to land as a chairman of the Lattelecom board.

In the meantime "Diena" has started publicly discussing lifestyle of another party mate of the outgoing PM. Apparently the "nothing special minister" son's water sport activities were supported not only up to the fall of his father from grace , but through the State Company "Latvijas Meži" hefty (circa 150 000EUR) grant was disbursed under shady terms also for the 2009 season. After Transport Supremo driver's son had to "retire", now is the "special minister's" turn to give up his sporting activities, must he not? Hmmm, and how should I explain to my students that education is a must in todays globalized world, because system of meritocracy would reward their hard efforts later in their lives?:)

March 31, 2009 deadline and early elections

2009-03-25T05:19:00.000-07:00

No information is leaking out from the Riga Castle concerning the life in Latvia after the March 31 deadline. President keeps reiterating that constitutional amendments must be passed by the that ominous date, but he does not yet disclose the possible future scenarios. In the meantime the speaker of the parliament and several other members of the "elite" already reiterated the traditional mesage about the early elections destroying the republic & economy. Meanwhile another odious representative of legal profession openly craved for dictatorship.

Early elections is a normal procedure in liberal democracies, and particularly so during times of constitutional and political crisis. This is the very situation the former governing "elite" had Latvia led into. While adding the economic turmoil Latvia must go through now, the Latvian society must really pass through the purgatory of triple crisis. The major opposition New Era (NE) party acknowledged such situation already in August 2008, and their present ratings would only capitalize their upward positions prior upcoming elections. The best way out of the overwhelming nihilism in the Latvian society would be achieved with the help of referendum for sacking of the parliament (Constitutional Art. 48). It could take place on June 6, 2009 together with the municipal and the European Parliament elections. Thus money would be saved on logistics and organization costs, and it would make also actions of the president transparent and comprehensible to the public.

It would be quite contrary to the continuously circling rumours about ensuing disaster that could ensue after sacking of the parliament [it would be the first precedent of early elections in Latvia]. The government of Valdis Dombrovskis would continue to work until the new parliament would be elected and new government formed. There have been numerous early elections in several European states, and Polish and Greek examples are still fresh in memory.

The president better make up his mind, and quick! Political events in the World and Europe are increasingly bypassing traditional chains of decision making process' in the small nation state [particularly the ill governed one]. Latvian present leaders cannot afford to continue as if "nothing special" happened, with the simple government facade uplift and without constitutional and legal amendments that are long overdue [amendments in electoral law and passing the mandatory tax and property declaration system]. Simply the younger generation would hemorrhage out of the country until the "traditional elite"would even notice it. Bulgarians already asked for the EU oversight, and I assume that Latvian president's team is knowledgeable enough not to wish it happening in Latvia? The present short term and complacent stability is fragile and built on thin ice. For monies the Latvian Treasury has acquired from Western donors, but without complete overhaul of the sluggish administrative machinery Latvian government would not be able to purchase even fish [stocks are depleted in the Baltic Sea anyway:)], because soon only fish bones would be left...

March 2009 public opinion in Latvia

2009-03-23T01:20:00.000-07:00

The last week of March started today and Latvijas Fakti in cooperation with Diena published the monthly poll. Customarily around 1000 Latvian citizens were asked: what political party you would vote for if elections would take place tomorrow?

And I just could not resist to add the Gatis Šļūka view on today's government travails:)

Final "pearls" of the hopefully outgoing political "elite" in Latvia

2009-03-21T06:28:00.000-07:00

There was an article in Helsingin Sanomat before, and in Der Zeit last month where the same picture was used, and making the "nothing special" slogan a real Latvian trademark.

© ILMARS ZNOTINS/AFP/Getty

It would have been rather encouraging news unless it was not uttered by the lacklustre former minister of finance. Former banker considered that "nothing special"could be used as a new trademark for advertising Latvia internationally. While such a proposal created some laughing in neighboring Estonia, I somehow believe that to come out with negative connotations for branding countries cannot really bring anything positive out. While there were numerous warning signs about the problems mounting in Латвия, the former government continued to live in their power bubble.

Instead to assess how come Latvian politicians were able to not to listen to numerous warning signs, announce orderly and early elections, and to continue from the clean sleet onwards, there is absolute stillness from the Riga Castle so far. I wish all the courage to the new government, but amidst their tasks in overhauling the outdated Latvian administrative machinery the president has probably forgotten that the early elections are primarily needed for returning legitimacy into democratic regime among the Latvian citizenry! Whether the president still keeps this option open we should see on March 32, 2009, as it has become customary to joke in Latvia lately.

In the meantime the Prime Minister Dombrovskis is forced to acknowledge that Latvian government would probably have to borrow additional 1 billion from international creditors in order to be on the safe side before the harsh autumn. In the same time the so-called "public relations engineers" are speculating that journalist are among those culprits to be blamed for Latvia finding itself in the sorry state of economy and social turmoil today. The same so-called "public relations engineers" somehow seem to forget that the former toothless and complacent government [who's representatives still sit in the parliament and government] is directly responsible for bringing Latvia at the verge of bankruptcy, and most of economics and business experts acknowledged it in their interview.

As if there would not be enough of bad news the former PM Šķēle came out with bombastic opinion yesterday. In his interview to the Latvian TV evening news (objectivity of the public TV must be questioned if thus many former politicians appear disproportionately often on air and give their reckless remarks) former PM somehow confirmed long circling rumours about changing his own mortgage from euros into Latvian lats. He opined that Latvian currency could be devalued and created quite an uproar in the Latvian Internet forums.

Also, former PM had an opinion that the Presidential deadline of March 31 and possible initiation of referendum process calling for early elections would be shortsighted, and detrimental to the very existence of the Republic of Latvia ["Savukārt uz jautājumu par to, vai Valsts prezidentam būtu jārosina Saeimas atlaišana pēc 31.marta, jo daļa prezidenta uzdevumu nav izpildīti, A.Šķēle atbildēja: "Tā būtu absolūta tuvredzība. Tā būtu Latvijas valsts iznīcināšana."]. Indeed, the early elections would be detrimental to the Latvia Ltd. and one of its architects, but most of the citizenry would sigh in relief when such law transgressing parties as People's Party and Latvia First/Latvian Way would cease to exists and would find themselves in the waste bin of history.

The Riga Southern bridge - citadel of inefficiency

2009-03-19T02:07:00.000-07:00

State Audit office published report about the construction process of the Southern bridge yesterday. After the media started questioning expenses of the newly built Southern bridge last year the Riga City Councilors behaved as if nothing happened. The State Audit office started their investigation in June 2008, and their conclusion is simple - about LVL27mlj. (EUR38mlj) of taxpayers monies were simply squandered due to the lack of legal enforcement of existing rules, and non-existence of financial oversight over the building process! The incumbent Maire of Riga called this revelation as shocking, while the former Maire who started the building considers the whole process of building the bridge as the most transparent and effective in Latvia, and blames the Prime Minister Dombrovskis about barring him to access the EU structural fund monies for running this project!

It is simply sick and tiring to follow the childish behavior of the outgoing political "elite" in Latvia. The papers are full of smaller or bigger scams and corruption cases, thus I have a feeling as if there is a serious need after some external juror from Brussels or Washington DC! The Augean Stalls of Latvian post Soviet nomenclature must be cleaned in order to bring Latvia out from the present economically malicious situation. You may wonder why I am questioning the inability of Latvian court system and civil society to manage this process?

Because, even while the new government gives encouraging signs of improvement, the old boys networks and the president being quiet about his March 31 deadline does not decrease suspicion in the society about the ability of the "presently elected councilors" to suddenly change their behavior. Just look into today's Diena , where the former Transport supremo without any remorse openly declares, that he would continue policy of nepotism, if being elected as the new Maire of Riga! In the same paper it is announced that Transport Supremo's appointed buddy in the RIX board Rota Mūrniece is accused in felony, and Mr Šlesers driver's son must leave now the board of the Latvian Passenger Railway Co., while another of his protege's must leave the well paid job of the press secretary. In any other liberally democratic country the full fledged investigation would ensue, and such "ministers" would be barred from the public office for life!!

Cartoon: Zemgus

Transport supremo renewed his mandate in the parliament, however, and plans to carry on with misuse of taxpayers monies in the Riga City Council. His understanding about the political process ends with simple understanding - there is nothing else except the zero sum game! Rule of law for him is founded on principles of bending it to the whims of more powerful and affluent folks. Transport Supremo is not a democrat, and lets hope that Riga citizens would keep it in mind, while the Latvian judiciary is still unable to start prosecution of this openly law transgressing person after breeches of law found by the State Audit office. Riga taxpayers have allowed themselves to drag into the financial serfdom for the next twenty years due to the the policy of nepotism and negligence of the former Maire's of Riga, thus do citizens really suffer the collective Stockholm syndrome?

Text in Latvian: Riga City Council wheel barrows "should get quietly over the bridge"

Cartoon: Jukka Rislakki

Another "jem" from the Latvian outgoing "elite" (Updated)

2009-03-17T01:27:00.000-07:00

Last weekend the Latvian First & Latvian Way party Union (LFLWU) was planning its congress. The party chief Ainārs Šlesers terminated his plans, thus the congress did not take place. However, the LFLWU announced that the former prime minister Ivars Godmanis should run for the European Parliament. Thank you, and what a nice competitor for the upcoming elections on June 6, 2009!

Ivars Godmanis is definitely better qualified than the minister who slaughtered (slakteris - a slaughter in Latvian language) the trust of the EU & IMF partners in ability of "Latvian outgoing elite" to bring the country out from economic malaise. As a requiem for the "outgoing political elite" here you have THE confession... .

Slakteris says his command of English is an important asset for Latvia

Published: 12:28 19.01.2009.
RIGA, Jan 19 (LETA) - Finance Minister Atis Slakteris (People's Party) believes his command of English to be one of the most valuable things that Latvia possesses.
In an interview on the Latvian State Radio this morning, Slakteris said that since he had been able to secure an EUR 7.5 billion loan for Latvia, his command of English is highly valuable for Latvia.
Slakteris said that, in his opinion, government members and his own command of English was sufficient at a time the state had to borrow funds from international partners.
As reported, Slakteris' interview to the U.S. "Bloomberg Television" last December created much publicity.
Slakteris' interview on "Bloomberg Television", that can be watched at several Internet portals at this time, showed that Slakteris does not know English well enough and even tends to forget the questions that he is being asked.
After the interview was made public, it prompted wide debate about Slakteris' suitability for office.
Slakteris said that the version of the interview that had leaked out was unedited and unofficial material.

Updated

As an eulogy to the outgoing political elite that has left the atomized Latvian society in poverty the Finnish author Jukka Rislakki had a special view about the Latvian political society today. After the 2008 second half Providus research it became known that 31,3 % of Latvian population actually supports so called Robin Hood's in Latvia... .

Text in Latvian: LARGEST AND MOST INFLUENTIAL PARTY IN LATVIA

31,3%

COULD SUPPORT POLITICIANS WHO STEAL BUT RIDISTRIBUTE IT TO OTHERS

Cartoon: Jukka Rislakki

Expensive and ineffective government

2009-03-15T23:06:00.000-07:00

The Latvian 2009 budget must be slashed by another 1 billion euros in order to receive next tranche from the International Monetary Fund, and avoid bankruptcy by June 2009. While the PM is looking for possibilities to cut expenses several investigative journalists have been looking where is the money really spent in Latvia. TV3 discovered that there are shady schemes created where money for non exiting projects are generated through the Latvian Investment and Development Agency (LIAA) with EU funds money squandered. Apparently Arvis Auziņš who was beneficiary of such a scam is the municipal councilor (Union of Greens and Farmer) in Ogre and he also tried to bribe a journalist.

While different scams are engineered for getting access to the EU funds monies, the Latvian civil service remuneration system is still a part of the party political "feudal fiefdoms" system and it causes a lot of bad blood. Legally the civil service should be apolitical, however it is long known that civil service does not act as a corporate entity in Latvia, that would act independently from whims of political parties. The system of remuneration in civil service is having similarly shady rules to the system of salaries in the State Enterprises boards, which served as a prime generators for monies into the political party coffers. Now most of the State Enterprise boards are liquidated, but the political party financing from the state budget has not replaced the old system yet.

The law introducing party financing from the state budget and the mandatory tax and property declaration system should be the major agenda for the present parliament. Without these two laws it is impossible to introduce the principles of transparency especially during times when there is increasing public awareness bout it. During times of global financial and economic crisis, which affects all countries participating in the era of global flows of goods, finance and ideas, particularly those countries with ineffective government are affected the most severe way and we may witness it very strongly in Latvia. As a proof that not only I am concerned about the way Latvia is governed today, you may have the very unique Gatis Šļūka view on the working methods of the Latvian parliament.

Text in Latvian: QUESTION: puk,puk,puk...tuk,tuk, tuk...bu, bu, bu...AN ANSWER: bla, bla, bla

Today's Diena had a nice report about salaries of the top - notch civil servants. And it just gives you insight about the questionable system of remuneration at the highest level of civil service in Latvia.

Average monthly salary of Latvian under secretaries*, before taxes (Ls)

Ministry / Under secretary /2008./2009.

Agriculture /Dace Lucaua /6532 /3539
Finance / Mārtiņš Bičevskis / 6043 /3564
Economics / Anrijs Matīss / 5217 / 4330
Municipal Affairs / Laimdota Straujuma /5122 / 2852
Children's Affairs / Iveta Zalpētere / 5058 / 2850
Education / Mareks Gruškevics / 4146 / 2852
Transportation / Nils Freivalds / 4003 / 3313
Welfare / Ringolds Beinarovičs / 3888/ 2852
Electronic affairs / Juris Jansons / 3496 / 2450
Defense /Jānis Sārts /3391 / 2744
Environment / Guntis Puķītis / 3372 / 2664
Justice / Mārtiņs Lazdovskis / 3148 / 2094
Foreign Affairs / Andris Teikmanis / 2947 / 2975
Health / Armands Ploriņš / 2890 / 2150
Internal affairs /Aivars Straume / 2746 / 2506
Culture / Solvita Zvidriņa / 2347 / 2000

*Under secretaries (Valsts sekretārs) are the top level civil servants in Latvia responsible for administering ministries. Monthly salary, vacation allowance, bonuses, additional premiums forms the average monthly salary of the under secretary
P.S. For those of you reading in Estonian here is my interview to Sirp.

God speed Valdis Dombrovskis!

2009-03-12T09:37:00.000-07:00

Today Valdis Dombrovskis became the fifteenth Prime Minister of Latvia, since this Baltic State regained its independence eighteen years ago. Happy to learn that Valdis Dombrovskis represents the same generation I do, and quite ominously he has become not only the youngest prime minister in Latvia, but he is also the youngest leader in the EU today. His new cabinet was approved with 67 YEA votes, and 21 NAY´s came from the majority russophone Harmony Centre and Human Rights parties in a hundred member parliament.

Photo: R.Olins/Apollo

In normal circumstances people should be celebrating but not this time in Latvia. Parliamentary majority accepted the new Corruption Bureau Chief Mr. Normunds Vilnitis, the politicized state enterprises councils were liquidated, and also ``the anti-Mafia`` law was finally passed in the parliament! However, those amendments were long overdue in this corruption ridden country. The former government led the country to the verge of the bankruptcy, and now Valdis Dombrovskis must lead the country out of the malaise together with former ``adversaries``. The task of the new PM is not going to be easy, because he would have to be constantly guarding his back from his own coalition members ...

Photo: Kristians Putnins

Decisions of the parliament to pass the long mulled laws and appoint Mr Vilnitis as the new Anti Corruption warrior are encouraging, thus, God speed Valdis Dombrovskis with your challenging work in overhauling the antiquated state machinery! Glad to realize, that also Gatis Šļūka in his cartoons has the same contemplations:)

Text in Latvian: [The question] What should we do? it simply does not operate...[an answer] We would reinstall it!

P.S. Here is my interview to ERR presented on the web thanks to the Päevaleht Online

Bad habits of the "outgoing political elite"...

2009-03-11T12:15:00.000-07:00

The newly formed government of Valdis Dombrovskis faces uphill struggle. In case Dombrovskis's government would be approved in tomorrow's Saeima session, and its seems the most likely scenario [to believe the snap opinion poll I have on the top right corner of this very page], the new government would have to cut government expenses for about another 1 billion euros to keep the 2009 fiscal deficit at -5% level.

If there is one extremely bad habit of the hopefully outgoing and self imposed "political elite" in Latvia, then it is the system of finding scapegoats for their own wrongdoings every time and everywhere. Like politicians in France their homologues in Latvia love to blame EU for most of their own shortcomings.

Below you may see today's front page of the second major Latvian daily NRA. Regardless of totally reckless and sometimes "puzzling" policy making of the former government the newspaper came out with the following header today - Eiropa prasa griezt skarbāk...

(text in Latvian) - Europe demands drastic [budget] cuts

P.S. I am listening to the Latvia's most popular talk show now, and the PM nominee Valdis Dombrovskis just announced that his government would seriously consider introducing the mandatory income declaration system as one of the first tasks of his government.

P.P.S. While the government published its declaration , also the People's Party nominated their candidate for the Minister of Culture today.

Two days until the new government vote

2009-03-10T08:31:00.000-07:00

There are two days left until the Latvian parliament would vote to give a mandate to the Valdis Dombrovskis care taker government. The presidential ultimatum still stands and since the onset there is a feeling that Mr Valdis Dombrovskis is forced to work in fire - fighting regime. New coalition - New Era, People´s, Party, Civic Union, Union of Greens and Farmers, and the Fatherland Party - agreed on the government declaration. The nominated PM candidate wants all the governing coalition MP´s to sign the coalition document to receive as broad and tangible mandate as possible, while the latter document is not available yet.

With the candidacy for the post of the Minister of Culture still open and ministers of health and education still wavering there is no better way to finish this blog entry, than with another poignant cartoon of Gatis Sluka. Enjoy:)

Text in Latvian: (Text on the screen) Reception of ministerial portfolios. Hallo, does anybody need a portfolio of the minister of education?

Latvian "vertical of power"

2009-03-09T10:20:00.000-07:00

Yesterday evening the Latvian LNT TV station had an unexpected talk show with all but one former primer ministers present, and Andris Bērziņš busy preparing for elections. My colleague Iveta Kažoka in her blog spared my time to immediately write my contemplations about the program in Latvian. The central question of the show was - what Latvia should do? - as if Latvia would be some kind of abstract entity, and it would not have basic mechanisms of state governance. The most active speakers were former prime ministers from the People's Party (PP). Other ministers chirped out some ideas as well, but somewhat miraculously central theme of the whole emission became - whether the future Latvian government should exercise emergency powers and resort to the vertical of power!

The odious Art. 81 allowed the Cabinet to exercise legislative powers while parliament was in recess. This article was rid from the Latvian Constitution after Aigars Kalvītis government tried to perform shadow coup d'etat at the end of 2006 with the secretive changes in the law of security organizations. Yesterday, it was the incumbent Prime Minister Ivars Godmanis who assumed that without resorting to the Art. 81, and endowing Latvian executive with legislative powers, there is no chance for the Valdis Dombrovskis future cabinet to solve the challenges Latvia is facing right now. There were only two ministers - Guntars Krasts & Einārs Repše - who objected to return of the Art. 81.

The anchor of the program could not really moderate the discussion thus former prime ministers' diatribes were unbearable for most of the time. Former PM Valdis Birkavs had an idee fixe that 80% of the Latvian civil servants should be given unpaid leave until the mess with the bloated Latvian government is solved. Also representing his own construction lobby, he believed that the only right solution for Latvia getting out of the present dire straits is propping up the construction business. Moderator paid undue "attention" to the proposed Minister of Finance in the future government, Mr Einārs Repše. He asked him and other PM's whether Latvian monetary authorities should not unilaterally decide about the Latvian currency switched over to euro? All former PM's agreed that stability of the Latvian currency is the prerequisite for leading Latvia out of the present economic swamp. Around the middle of the show the moderator asked the key question - what the former eight prime ministers considered their faults for having Latvia now on the verge of bankruptcy?

Einārs Repše tried to argue that probably he was too offensive with his onslaught on the Latvian corrupt networks and probably overestimated his personal powers, thus had to give in to the government of Indulis Emsis. Aigars Kalvītis and Andris Šķēle were drumming the same tambourine, and believed that they had been too mild in giving in to the requests of the trade unions. Other than that, those gentlemen did not find a single fault (!) in their performance. Such issues as the rule of law and personal responsibility simply did not appear in that discussion. The personal willpower and extreme form of technocratic approach to problems was omnipresent, thus "Latvian self proclaimed political elite members" came to conclusion that if there would not been the coalition "cow trading" their work would have been a lot more easier whilst having possibility to resort to emergency powers. Thus much about the traditional cognisance of democracy among six (!) former prime ministers in Латвия... .

I never had any hopes about any of the Latvian AAA team ministers. At least there is a flicker of hope about the future cabinet being able to lead the country in one piece until the early elections. The trust in democratic regime among Latvian populace was lost very much due to the same authoritarian prime ministers exercising their power unaccounted. The results are not far to look after, because latest polls show that about a quarter of the Latvian population would better prefer authoritarian dictator than party democracy in Latvia... . The quarter of population is probably the same that does not want to take part in elections, that monthly sociological pollsters regularly show us.

The new government should be voted in the parliament the coming Thursday. The new government still does not have the candidate for the minister of culture. At least the opposition New Era (NE) party seems like playing the chicken game, because they announced about reevaluation of the formerly signed agreements about super-expensive construction of the National Library. PP has not openly opposed this announcement, but the former ministers of health and education have voiced their doubts about taking their posts in the future government, because according to them additional 20% budget cuts (in addition to the -15% initiated already in January 2009) are too drastic. However, the IMF and EU conditionality is a good mechanism, because monies are not disbursed until requested agreements are reached. Previously mentioned ministers and PP party should understand, that if they would undermine the Valdis Dombrovskis formed cabinet they would pull also themselves into the dustbin of history. Thus, I consider the PP leadership frantic holding to the demand for control over the EU structural fund cash flows as sign of extreme weakness of that party (apparently they do not have neither human resources nor funds, if they plan to propose Ms Anta Rugāte for the Culture Minister post). The Valdis Dombrovskis formed government would have several priorities to perform in order to reignite the frozen Latvian economy. But before that, lets wait for the Thursday vote in the parliament. And while waiting for the vote, you may perceive the prevailing mood among the Latvian public about the bacchanalia's of the former government through another poignant cartoon of Gatis Šļūka.

Text in Latvian: [Men in Red hat]: Where is the booze? It was a hard and unpopular decision.

First draft of the V. Dombrovskis government (updated)

2009-03-03T10:34:00.000-08:00

Valdis Dombrovskis declared today that he would announce the list of the new cabinet members on Wednesday morning . Until now the initial draft looks as follows:

Prime Minister — Valdis Dombrovskis (New Era-NE)
Minister of Forign Affairs — Māris Riekstiņš (People's Party-PP)
Minister of Defense — Candidate from the Civic Union (CU) (probability to have either V. Kristovskis or Kārlis Šadurskis)
Minister of Justice — Mareks Segliņš (PP)
Minister of Economy — Artis Kampars (NE)
Minister of Finance — Einars Repše (NE)
Minister of Transportation — Kaspars Gerhards (Fatherland Party)
Minister of Interior — Linda Mūrniece (NE)
Minister o Education — Tatjana Koķe (Union of Greens and Farmers-UGF)
Minister of Culture — Candidate from the PP ( probability to have Juris Žagars)
Minister of Agriculture — Jānis Dūklavs (UGF)
Minister of Welfare — Uldis Augulis (UGF)
Minister of Municipal Affairs — Edgars Zalāns (PP)
Minister of Health — Ivars Eglītis (PP)
Minister of Environment — Raimonds Vējonis (UGF)

Out of fifteen ministries there are five ministers from the previous government, three members of NE party have ministerial experience, and a true newcomer of this list is the former brewer Jānis Dūklavs. There could be a newcomer also for the Minister of Culture post, and unless the Civic Union party would propose Ģirts Valdis Kristovskis, we could have newcomer also in the Ministry of Defense.

It is too early to judge the future cabinet, because this draft list could still be amended. However, the immediate tasks of cutting budget for about another EUR 1 billion until the end of March, does not allow the new government to start slimming the government. Otherwise such lacklustre ministers as K. Gerhards, T. Koķe, and M. Segliņš would not even be proposed. However, really good news is that the Latvian First Party/Latvia's Way (LFP/LW) would not be included in the governing coalition. Former PM Godmanis was offered to lead the Ministry of Agriculture but he perceived it rather like an insult. Thus, very much due to the Transport Supremo extravagance and Ivars Godmanis following him in short leash the once major liberal party is out of the government, again... .

Update

It is Wednesday morning and Valdis Dombrovskis has come up with the Minister of Defense candidature, while the Minister of Culture post being still vacant. The Civic Union has offered the post to its party member Imants Lieģis, a former ambassador to Spain.

Good luck Valdis Dombrovskis!

2009-02-26T00:15:00.000-08:00

In a quarter an hour the President of Latvia should speak at the press conference. After former Prime Minister Godmanis handed in his letter of resignation Latvia needed a new PM quickly. Urgency of decision making is needed due to the structural problems of the Latvian economy [rather ominously Latvian president would hold talks with the prominent group of economic experts after the press conference today] as well as due to the ongoing negotiations with the International Monetary Fund. As if to prove the speed of decision making in Latvia also the Latvian Parliament started their session early today [listening to the live session of the Saeima on LR], and already with 85 YEA voices passed the constitutional amendments in first reading, while agreeing that those same amendments would be voted in second reading on March 10, 2009. Those are the same constitutional amendments that brought about 650 000 Latvian citizens to the election booths last summer. It seems as if the parliament is in a hurry now to pass all the presidential requirements prior the deadline of March 31 expires, because the parliament plans also to pass the amendments in election law in the third and final reading.

The president already announced that he would decide between the two candidates - Valdis Dombrovskis and Edgars Zalāns. From the experience, skills, merits... and finally from the common sense point of view [you do not trust the party representative who created all this mess!] the president should give Valdis Dombrovskis a chance to form a large coalition government.

The president just came [9:40CET] out with his announcement and common sense still prevails in Republic of Latvia - Valdis Dombrovskis is a new PM nominee!

At the end there was only one...

Photo: Lita Krone (LETA/Diena)

Valdis Dombrovskis nominated other two opposition Civic Union and Society for Another Politics parties as the immediate partners in the upcoming coalition building process. People's Party (PP), Union of Greens and Farmers as well as Fatherland and Freedom Party would be asked to participate in coalition building process, that should together give them 64 vote majority in the hundred member Saeima. According to Dombrovskis he expects the new government to be formed within two weeks. The president announced that he has listened to solid promises from the expected coalition parties to take part in the newly formed government, and if some of the parties would fail to support the future government then it would be the responsibility of those parties themselves, thus basically allowing the president still to stick to the ominous March 31 deadline. The PP behavior was suspicious during last days, and it felt as if they neither want to have the PM post nor want to support the opposition candidate for the PM office. The issue of early elections is still looming above the parliamentarians, and it clashes with the personal interests of certain members of care taking government now. The upcoming two weeks would be hot, and I would not exclude the scenario of the majority of MP's not being able to agree on the Valdis Dombrovskis future cabinet.

Finnish author and cartoonist Jukka Rislaki presented a rather colourful vision of the present Latvian environment. The parliament is discussing amendments in election law right at this moment and while listening to the speeches I am sadly realizing how backward Latvian MP's are. Those issues they discuss now, should have been discussed fifteen years ago. At economically turbulent times, when different fiscal and economic policies should be discussed Latvian MP's are still busy with polity matters, huh, uhhh. Anyway, lai sokas Valdi Dombrovski!

Text in Latvian: [Phoenix] New Government, Phoenix wants to rise from ashes again

Cartoon: Juka Rislaki

P.S. For those of you reading Estonian here is my Delfi piece today.

Rõõmsat Eesti Vabariigi Aastapäeva! *

2009-02-24T00:35:00.000-08:00

* Merry Anniversary of the Republic of Estonia!

It is the ninety first anniversary of the Northernmost of the Baltic States, and there is a military parade in Narva today. The tradition to have military parades in different Estonian cities makes different parts of Estonia to feel being part of res publica. Corrupt and selfish politicians particularly during the years of economic boom, that coincided with the time when Estonia joined the European Union, tarnished the ideals of republic. Nevertheless, I honestly believe that there are enough patriotic and honest enough politicians in Estonia to form a critical mass for leading Estonia through today's economically turbulent times. Trust of the population in Eesti Vabariik and their representatives is stable, although the support for political parties declined across all the political spectrum due to curbing of public expenses lately. There are certain opposition parties in Estonia who care more about the well being of single politician and his lobbies, but its not the domestic politics I am here to write today.

Major reason for typing onto my keyboard today is the fact that I am celebrating the birthday of the Republic of Estonia. I am writing while simultaneously listening to the Estonian Broadcasting Corporation emission from the Skiing World Championships, where couple of days ago Andrus Veerpalu became the World Champion in the 15 km classical race! Estonia is my spiritual home not just because my mother is Estonian or because I studied at the University of Tartu, but foremost due to the vital Estonian people giving me enormous positive energy! Thus, to all my Estonian friends wherever you are now - SUURIMAD ŌNNESOOVID!!

During my last visit to Estonia I purchased a movie "Singing Revolution", that I suggest all the folks who are "hooked on Baltics" must see. Ominous songs of Tõnis Mägi inspired me already in the late 1980', when I had an opportunity to listen to him for the first time during the Independence Rock Concert ("Roks par Neatkarību") in the Riga old Sports Palace. I tend to hum his visionary song [The Dawn] whenever I am in contemplative mood. Whenever I visit Estonia the feeling never leaves me that the message from this powerful song reached the hearts and souls of Estonian people. Thus, to finish here I only hope that the similarly ominous lyrics of Auseklis and Jāzeps Vītols "Gaismas Pils" would reach the hearts and souls of Latvian folks one day! If Latvians and other folks wonder what kind of gospel visionary Tõnis Mägi delivered twenty years ago, then I have added lyrics of this song below.

"KOIT" - The Dawn (1988)

Again it’s time to stand up straight and cast off our shackles
That everything once created could together be born again
It’s dawn, a majestic blaze, Victory of the light awakes the land
Free is the horizon, and the first ray will soon touch the land
A call to break down it all, that we could freely breathe again
See, the ice has broken, let’s join our hands and forces
With wisdom, collective wisdom, with collective might, we can do it all
Ahead is the only road, the road to freedom, there can be no other
The might, the power of light, the people of freedom, let’s go together
With a joyful cry on our lips, see, the giant has freed himself
Faith leads us onward, and a heavenly beam accompanies us
So there’s only one step to victory, a short, short step
It’s the land, our sacred fatherland, that now will be free
The song, our song of victory, will continue, and soon you’ll see Estonia free!

"Koit"
Music and lyrics by Tõnis Mägi

On jälle aeg selg sirgu lüüaja heita endalt orjarüü,
et loomishoos kõik loodukoos võiks sündida uuesti.
On koit, kuninglik loit,valguse võit äratab maa.
Prii on taevapiir, esimene kiirlangemas on maale.
Hõik - murrame kõik,et vabana saaks hingata taas.
Näe - on murdunud jääulatagem käed, ühendagem väed.
Nõul, ühisel nõul,ühisel jõul, me suudame kõik.
Ees on ainus tee, vabaduse teeteist ei olla saagi.
Võim, valguse võimpriiuse hõim, läheme kooshuulil rõõmuhüüd
Näe, on kaljust käe kätte saanud hiid.
Usk edasi viib, taevane kiirsaatmas on meid
Nii - on võiduni jäänud veel üks sammlühike samm, samm
Maa, isademaa, on püha see maa, mis vabaks nüüd saab
Laul, me võidulaul, kõlama see jääb, peagi vaba Eestit näed!