Estonia Political Briefing: the 2019 Riigikogu Elections: Done, but Not Dusted E-MAP Foundation MTÜ

Home , Estonian Centre Party, Estonian Reform Party

ISSN: 2560-1601

Vol. 16, No. 1 (EE)

March 2019

Estonia political briefing: The 2019 Riigikogu elections: done, but not dusted E-MAP Foundation MTÜ

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The 2019 Riigikogu elections: done, but not dusted

The long-awaited 2019 parliamentary elections in Estonia are history. However, this undisputed fact represents only the ultimate finale of a single process. The elections were held to form the country’s next Government, and from now, it is a ‘whole-new kettle of fish’. The old promises and predictions are becoming blurry, being ruthlessly moderated by each and every party’s desire to be an integral part of the governmental coalition, for as long as it could be possible during the upcoming 4-year term. In a number of our previous briefings on Estonian politics, some arithmetic was done in regards of possible configurations, which the prospective cabinet could have. It was clearly underscored that absolutely all of those options could be considered relevant if no Estonian political party would be inclining to enter a serious discussion with the Conservative People’s Party of Estonia (Eesti Konservatiivne Rahvaerakond or EKRE). In the pre-elections period, the latter political establishment, while exposing a noticeably xenophobic political rhetoric, had been growing from strength to strength in all polls. Has the situation changed after 3 March? Have those politicians, who were publically denouncing a possibility to communicate with EKRE on a perspective to form a coalition with them, changed their mind since then?

The e-vote as a good indicator of the winner Since Estonia is a global champion in the sphere of e-governance, there is no big surprise that a significant number of Estonian citizens prefer casting their votes electronically, using their e-signature. In principle, the Internet-based voting (I-voting) was possible to be done around the clock, from the 10th until the 4th day before the elections day1. In 2015, the Estonian I-voters’ share among participating voters represented 30.5%2, an astonishing result that looked like a political ‘science fiction’ for other countries. In 2019, the voters’ turnout was high enough to be positively acknowledged (565,045 out of 887,420 or 63.7%), but the number of people who voted electronically broke all possible records – 247,232 citizens did cast their votes online, and it made the I-voters’ segment among participating voters being 43.75%3. Most probably, the next Riigikogu elections in 2023 will see the majority of the country’s voters to

1 ‘Internet voting in Estonia’ in Valimised. Available from [https://www.valimised.ee/en/internet-voting/internet- voting-estonia]. 2 ‘Statistics about Internet Voting in Estonia’ in Valimised. Available from [https://www.valimised.ee/en/archive/statistics-about-internet-voting-estonia]. 3 ‘Total of Estonia’ in Valimised. Available from [https://rk2019.valimised.ee/en/voting-result/voting-result- main.html].

1 be ‘casting’ their ‘ballots’ electronically – it is going be a revolutionary change in democratic practices.

However, until that occurs, the outcome of the 2019 elections was no less revolutionary – by the end of business in the country-wide polling stations, the State Electoral Committee immediately confirmed that the I-voting was won by the opposition – the Estonian Reform Party collected 40% of the total votes in the segment, followed by the EKRE that managed to receive 13.5%4. With necessity and keeping in mind the already known total number of the Estonian citizens who had voted, it became possible to argue (even before the rest of the votes would be counted) that the Estonian Reform Party was to win the elections with a significant margin. The political party, which was the leading force in five consecutive Estonian Governments from April 2005 until November 2016, was getting ready to come out from the oppositional shadow to champion the formation of the country’s new cabinet. An early moment to celebrate it was.

The aggregated polling data vs. the voting results In order to follow and, with a certain luck, understand the outcome of the 2019 Riigikogu elections, it would be logical to compare the actual results with the aggregated polling data recorded for the two month that were preceeding the elections. Even having had a hurried look at the numbers presented by PollofPolls.eu5 (aggregation trend line Kalman Smooth), it is possible to argue that the official record on the final digits6 is, in fact, not too far away from the aggregated polling data for January and February (see Table 1 for more details).

4 ‘Reform Party overwhelmingly wins the e-vote’ in ERR. 3 March 2019. Available from [https://news.err.ee/916336/reform-party-overwhelmingly-wins-e-vote]. 5 ‘All polls for Estonia’ in Pollof•Polls.eu. Available from [https://pollofpolls.eu/EE]. 6 ‘Voting and election result’ in Valimised. Available from [https://rk2019.valimised.ee/en/election- result/election-result.html].

Table 1: Aggregated polling data (January-February 2019) and the elections results (March 2019), Estonia7

Date of recording/aggregated % vs. the actual result Political party 3 January 2019 3 February 2019 3 March 2019

The Estonian Centre Party 26% 27% 23.1%

The Estonian Reform Party 24% 26% 28.9%

The Conservative People’s Party 19% 17% 17.8% of Estonia

The Social Democratic Party 11% 10% 9.8%

Pro Patria 8% 8% 11.4%

Estonia 200 6% 5% 4.4%

The Estonian Free Party 1% 1% 1.2%

The Estonian Greens 2% 3% 1.8%

Source: Pollof•Polls.eu and Valimised.ee

The above shown figures confirmed the fact that only the following political parties are on their way to be entering the next Riigikogu: the already mentioned Estonian Reform Party and EKRE will be having a company of the Estonian Centre Party, the Social Democratic Party, and Pro Patria. The other political establishments, including the Estonian Free Party that scored big time in 2015, did not manage to pass a nationwide threshold of 5% and, therefore, will be outside of the Estonian Parliament for the next four years at least. The Estonia 200, a prospective newcomer to the Riigikogu, dramatically failed to deliver in the final stage of the campaign, losing a good half of what the polling data had been predicting for them at the beginning. The factor that the Estonia 200 dropped out from the list of prospective coalitional partners for either the Estonian Reform Party or the Estonian Centre Party (or for both of them) represents one of the main explanations of what happened next.

7 ‘All polls for Estonia’.

On 3 March, closer to midnight, the Republic of Estonia learned the main set of digits, which were brought by the elections – out of the total 101, how many seats each party will be possessing in the next Riigikogu (see Table 2)

Table 2: Number of seats per party based on the 2019 Riigikogu elections results

Political party Number of seats

The Estonian Reform Party 34

The Estonian Centre Party 26

EKRE 19

Pro Patria 12

The Social Democratic Party 10

Source: Valimised.ee

It became painfully obvious for the ruling coalition of the Estonian Centre Party, the Social Democratic Party and Pro Patria that, together, they will not be scoring the number of seats required for enjoying the parliamentary majority. With an immediate effect, this kind of revelation made the whole process to be featured by a very high degree of uncertainty – this is when a situational political ‘friend’ can easily become a situational political ‘enemy’. On such an occasion, the contrary can effectively work in exactly the same fashion. EKRE that collected 99,671 votes was to increase the party’s presence at the Riigikogu by 271%, adding 12 more seats to their parliamentary faction. Nobody was going to be a ‘friend’ of ERKE before? What a banality! These sentiments remained in the almost forgotten past, and, without engaging any algebra, the explicit list of probable configurations of the prospective Estonian Government appeared before the electorate in a trivial way (see Table 3 for details).

Table 3: Probable configurations of the prospective Estonian Government

Configurations Combined number of seats at the Riigikogu

1. The Estonian Reform Party, The Social Democratic Party, 56 Pro Patria 2. The Estonian Reform Party, 60 The Estonian Centre Party 3. The Estonian Reform Party, The Estonian Centre Party, 70 The Social Democratic Party 4. The Estonian Reform Party, The Estonian Centre Party, 82 The Social Democratic Party, Pro Patria 5. The Estonian Reform Party, EKRE, 65 Pro Patria 6. The Estonian Centre Party, The Social Democratic Party, 67 EKRE, Pro Patria 7. The Estonian Centre Party, EKRE, 57 Pro Patria

Source: Constructed by E-MAP Foundation MTÜ and based on Valimised.ee

Having lost one parliamentary seat as compared to the 2015 results, the Estonian Centre Party found themselves in a position with a super-limited ability to perform effective manoeuvring. The exact coalition they were leading from November 2016 is not going to be ‘repeated’, and it pushed the party’s leader and the current Prime Minister Jüri Ratas to make some important statements on the elections night. As reported, when he was asked on whether or not the Estonian Centre Party would be ready enter a governmental coalition as a junior partner, Jüri Ratas immediately gave his “Of course”, while adding that “I will work to see the Centre Party in the best possible positions in the next coalition”8. This signal about the Prime Minister’s readiness to consider a junior-type of partnership was heard on the other side and

8 Jüri Ratas in ‘Ratas: Centre will do utmost to be part of next coalition’. ERR. 3 March 2019. Available from [https://news.err.ee/916352/ratas-centre-will-do-utmost-to-be-part-of-next-coalition].

5 interpreted in a very direct way – on 6 March, the Estonian Reform Party’s board decided to give a green light for having a conversation with the Estonian Centre Party on the coalition. On the day, the party’s leader, Kaja Kallas, stated the following:

We will propose launching coalition talks with the Centre Party. […] We have quite a lot in common with both Pro Patria and the Social Democrats. […] The problem is first and foremost how they get along with one another. Both claimed that they would join the coalition together with the baggage from the current government, and that is a pre-programmed difficulty. […] If [the Estonian Reform Party and the Estonian Centre Party] combined represent two thirds of the electorate, this would be the coalition that would most represent [Estonian] voters. […] That is the most important thing.9

The above statement was, however, contradicting with another one, which was made by the same Kaja Kallas a couple of days before, during her interview to Postimees:

We need to look at the possibilities. It is arithmetic inside 101. I have ruled out cooperation with EKRE. Estonia 200 will likely be left out of the Riigikogu. This means there will be just three parties we can talk to. The Social Democrat Party and Pro Patria would be our first preference.10

From then on, the ball of events started rolling leftward, rightward as well as up and down. A perspective for the country’s two largest parties to establish a cabinet that could have 60 votes at the Riigikogu started generating avalanches of commentaries from all politically-concerned clusters of the Estonian society. Those parliamentary parties that felt the ‘heat’ of a crashing miss-out decided to act. On the same day when the intentions of the Estonian Reform Party to test the waters on forming a coalition with the Estonian Centre Party became known, the leader of Pro Patria, Helir-Valdor Seeder, stated:

We are prepared to talk to everyone. […] We now have more freedom morally – and the obligation – to take a look around together with other partners. […] The winner of the elections has made its choice. We will naturally wait and see what Centre’s

9 Kaja Kallas in ‘Reform to begin coalition talks with Centre party’. ERR. 6 March 2019. Available from [https://news.err.ee/917068/reform-to-begin-coalition-talks-with-centre-party]. 10 Kaja Kallas in ‘Kaja Kallas: our first choice is a government with Isamaa and SDE’. Postimees. 4 March 2019. Available from [https://news.postimees.ee/6537206/kaja-kallas-our-first-choice-is-a-government-with-isamaa- and-sde].

response is, but we will definitely also speak with the other political parties as well. […] Kaja Kallas called me on the way to the studio, congratulated us for earning second place in the pre-negotiation round, and said that they have decided to begun talks with the Centre Party.11

A particular sarcastic way that Helir-Valdor Seeder chose to deliver his message distinctly showed some irritation of Pro Patria – most probably, they were seriously considering a coalition with the ‘reformers’, and the latter decided to talk to the ‘centrists’ first. In her turn, perhaps, Kaja Kallas was remembering and trying to rely on the Jüri Ratas’ “Of course”. After all, having a glance at the personal result of the elections (the electoral district no. 4, covering Harju- and Raplamaa), Jüri Ratas with his 9,702 votes was absolutely no match to Kaja Kallas who collected 20,072 ballots in her favour12. In all cases, both Pro Patria and the Estonian Reform Party had to wait until the ‘centrists’ get together to decide on the proposal of the party that won the elections.

It did not take long for the country to see a political ‘lightning’ – on 8 March, the board of the Estonian Centre Party met and decided to reject the offer of the ‘reformers’. Jüri Ratas announced the decision and, as reported, noted that “it was differences of opinion [between the two parties] when it came to tax matters that ended up being the red line”13. Immediately, being visibly shaken by the announcement and, speculatively, realising that she made a rookie’s mistake to think that an outgoing Prime Minister will be easily accepting a secondary position, Kaja Kallas gathered her party’s board to decide that the Estonian Reform Party will be approaching the ‘social democrats’ and Pro Patria next14. History remembers that, back in November 2016, the ‘reformers’-led Estonian Government was ‘toppled’ down by the deal, which the two junior partners (the Social Democratic Party and Pro Patria) decided to conclude with the then oppositional ‘centrists’. Overnight, Taavi Rõivas and his Estonian Reform Party went into opposition, and the Republic of Estonia got a new Prime Minister, Jüri Ratas.

11 Helir-Valdor Seeder in ‘Isamaa looking into possible coalition with Centre, EKRE, SDE’. ERR. 6 March 2019. Available from [https://news.err.ee/917110/isamaa-looking-into-possible-coalition-with-centre-ekre-sde]. 12 ‘Elected members of the Riigikogu’ in Valimised. Available from [https://rk2019.valimised.ee/en/election- result/elected-members.html]. 13 ‘Centre rejects Reform's offer to begin coalition talks’ in ERR. 8 March 2019. Available from [https://news.err.ee/918142/centre-rejects-reform-s-offer-to-begin-coalition-talks]. 14 ‘Kallas: Reform to approach Isamaa, Social Democrats next’ in ERR. 8 March 2019. Available from [https://news.err.ee/918169/kallas-reform-to-approach-isamaa-social-democrats-next].

This time, having already rebuffed the ‘reformers’ and having no Estonia 200 around, the outgoing Prime Minister decided to hold on. On 11 March, the board of the Estonian Centre Party decided to begin coalitional talks with Pro Patria and EKRE15. Eventually, the ‘lightning’ produced the sound, and this ‘thunder’ will be rock-n-rolling in Estonia for years. From now, EKRE has been given a unique chance, which can prospectively lead this ultra-right establishment towards becoming an integral part of the Estonian Government. The story will continue in the next briefing, as this development has the capacity to become a catalyst for myriads of factors to be actioned. While the Centre-EKRE-Pro Patria negotiations are under way (experiencing some relative successes), there is a particular constitutional role that the Estonian President will be playing in the process. Most probably, Kersti Kaljulaid, when she returns back home from an overseas trip, will offer Kaja Kallas the opportunity to form the next governmental coalition. Keeping in mind the fact that the prospective cabinet formed by the Centre-EKRE-Pro Patria trio has currently the support of 24% of voting-age citizens16 (it is already 28% short if compared to the three parties’ total elections result recorded less than two weeks ago), some members of the Riigikogu from the Estonian Centre Party and Pro Patria will predictable have plenty of issues with their own voters. Therefore, let us stay tuned.

15 ‘Centre board announces decision to begin coalition talks with Isamaa, EKRE’ in ERR. 11 March 2019. Available from [https://news.err.ee/918712/centre-board-announces-decision-to-begin-coalition-talks-with- isamaa-ekre]. 16 Urmas Jaagant, ‘Poll: voters prefer other coalitions’ in Postimees. 14 March 2019. Available from [https://news.postimees.ee/6545414/poll-voters-prefer-other-coalitions].