True nature of the Latvian governing coalition

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?

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

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

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

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

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

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.