The third session of the current Riigikogu will begin on Monday, but the disposition of the political forces has changed slightly compared to the end of last year. The Center Party can emerge from the crisis, but certainly not the Riigikogu faction of the Center Party, says journalist Uku Toom in his political commentary.
A year ago, the composition of the XIV Riigikogu began its last session and the Center Party faction had 23 members. There were 26 of them. Three members, or 11.5%, disappeared within four years. Now, ten months after the Riigikogu elections, the faction has seven members. There were 16. Nine members were lost, or 56%. And there are still three years to go.
If the president of the Center Party, Mihhail Kõlvart, says that the Center Party will emerge from the current crisis, you can believe it or not. But it is very difficult to imagine how the parliamentary faction can emerge from the crisis. As a serious force, the Central faction has ceased to exist, and here it is both quality and quantity.
It’s not just a question of numbers. In the past there were also factions with six and seven members in the Riigikogu, but it was a united, capable and experienced team. But whether the players of the big team are in the Riigikogu, for example Aleksei Yevgrafov or Aleksander Chaplygin, I don’t know. And how does Jüri Ratas fit into the 100% pro-Kõlvart team, for which the classic definition fits this situation: stranger to him, precisely to strangers. While Ratas himself is the only member of the faction who has any prior experience of the core faction’s work. Korobeinik also has experience, but belongs to the Reform Party faction. The remaining five are newcomers. So it is very difficult to say what the working capacity of the Central Group will be in the future
Take, for example, the fact that there are ten standing committees in the Riigikogu, where the voice of the faction should be heard. also the Committee on European Union Affairs. Since Jüri Ratas is vice president of the Riigikogu, four committees will be left without a central party member. Who will appoint the party to the finance commission, where they were previously represented by Jaak Aab and Kersti Sarapuu?
By the way, speaking of the advice. Elections for the new board of directors will be held in March and it is somehow strange to think that the smallest fraction of the Parliament would get the post of vice-president. One can therefore be fairly certain that Jüri Ratas will continue to be an ordinary member of the Riigikogu from the end of March.
Money is also taken less from the faction. Funding faction personnel costs consists of two parts: basic money and money, the size of which depends on the number of faction members. With the loss of nine members, the group will also lose more than 4 thousand euros per month, probably also the positions of some councilors and a vice president of the group. The chancellery of the Riigikogu wins, because the parliamentarians left without a faction do not take money with them elsewhere.
Finally, I don’t know if the rooms will be redistributed as part of the preparations, but the thought might arise if the faction that has been reduced by more than half will not be able to survive in smaller rooms.
2024-01-08 05:39:00
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