RESULTATS ELECCCIONS LEGISLATIVES A ESTÒNIA (04.03.2007)

Date: March 5th 2007

On the 4th of March elections to the Parliament (Riigikogu) of Estonia took place. Estonian Social Democratic Party (SDE) improved its position and got the 4th result. Elections gave us 10.6% of the votes and 10 seats (out of 101) in the Parliament (previously 6 seats).

The market-liberal Reform Party, led by Prime Minister Andrus Ansip, scored first time a decisive victory in national elections with 27.8%. They managed to increase their number of seats in the Parliament from 19 to 31. Their coalition partner, left populist Centre Party, led by controversial Minister of Economy Edgar Savisaar scored second with 26.1% of the votes and increased their seats from 28 to 29. However they were expected to win, which makes them one of the losers in the elections. Biggest opposition party – the merger of two conservative parties – Pro Patria and Res Publica Union scored third with 17.9% by decreasing their seats from 35 (28 of Res Publica Union and 7 of Pro Patria) to 19. However, they were not considered losers of the elections as the polls before the elections showed them lower result.

Fourth, as mentioned, were social democrats. Our result is more or less satisfactory, though we ourselves expected maybe few seats extra, but we did not get them because a Green Party was established 3 months before the elections and they took many of our votes. However, the polls before the elections showed us sometimes even more than two times lower results, and that is why and also due to the increase in seats we are considered to be among the winners of the elections.

Fifth and sixth place were shared by the newcomers of the elections – the Greens and the left populist agrarian party People’s Union, which is presently third party in the ruling coalition. Both gained 7.1% of the votes and 6 seats. Greens, however, were expected to get even up to twice more seats according to all the polls before the elections, so there was a slight disappointment in their result. The new Green party is not a typical left wing Western European Green Party, but tends to lean to the right. The People’s Union is considered to be among the biggest losers of the elections as their number of seats decreased from 13 to 6. Only six parties received seats in the parliament.

Election campaigning seemed largely devoid of issues and was dominated instead by the money and corruption scandals. Both of the winning parties – the Reform Party and the Centre Party promised simply higher salaries and pensions to the voters and had massive campaigns to promote their views. The money spent for the campaign was the largest ever: according to estimations 130 million Estonian crowns - EEK (almost 10 million €), and almost 110 millions of it was spent by the three winning parties. Our spending was among the lowest – approximately 5 million EEK. This was due to lack of support from the businessmen, who are mainly supporting ruling and right wing parties. Also corruption scandals were high in election issues. The Centre Party's leader was again accused on different corruptive cases related to his property and the People’s Party who holds Ministry of Environment and Agriculture was involved in many corruptive, mainly land frauds in their areas.
 
Our strategy was to end the corruption and to increase the living standard of the people, so that people would not have to leave Estonia to work in other countries. Our 10 mandates came all from different constituencies. We failed to get seats only in two constituencies out of 12: the Russian populated and Centre Party dominated border region and the People’ Party dominated agrarian area.

All 3 of Estonian PES Group MEPs ran at the national elections. Of them 2 could be members of the national parliament according to the votes and distribution of mandates, but they will stay in European Parliament: Mrs Katrin SAKS - 2028 votes and Mr Andres TARAND - 1122 votes. Mrs Marianne MIKKO got 1231 votes.

Last but not least, Estonia became also the very first country in the world, which used e-elections (internet based election) at the national elections. Total 30,243 citizens (3.4% of the electorate) used their ID cards to cast the ballot electronically through internet.

Party lists gained in Estonia following results:

Reform Party 27.8 % - 31 seats (19 before), ALDE
Centre Party 26.1% - 29 seats (28), ALDE
Pro Patria and Res Publica Union 17.9% - 19 seats (35), EPP-ED
Estonian Social Democratic Party 10.6% (6), PES
Green Party 7.1 % - 6 seats (-), not represented in the European Parliament (EP)
Peoples Union 7.1% - 6 seats (13), UEN (not represented in the EP)

Rest of the votes went to the smaller parties that failed to get a representation in the Parliament.