TALLINN, Estonia (AP) – Estonia’s two largest political parties signed an agreement on Sunday to form a new government headed by a prime minister for the first time in the Baltic country’s history, replacing the previous cabinet collapsed into a corruption scandal earlier this month.
The councils of the opposition party, the center-right reformist party and the government. the center-left, center-left party voted in favor of joining a cabinet headed by the prime minister-designate and president of reform, Kaja Kallas.
Both parties will have seven ministerial portfolios in addition to the post of Kallas prime minister in the 15-member government, which would bring the majority to the Riigikogu Parliament, with 101 seats.
A joint statement said the Reform Party and the Center Party “will form a government that will continue to effectively resolve the COVID-19 crisis, maintain Estonia for the future and develop all areas and regions of our country.”
Earlier this month, President Kersti Kaljulaid, who is expected to appoint the Kallas cabinet in the coming days, said addressing the worsening situation in the Estonian coronavirus and the economic turmoil caused by the pandemic would have of being an immediate priority for the new government.
Kaljulaid, Estonia’s first female head of state since 2016, commissioned Kallas to form the government as her pro-business and business reformist party emerged as the winner of the March 2019 Estonian general election.
Pending the approval of lawmakers, Kallas, 43, will become the first woman head of government in the history of the small Baltic nation of 1.3 million to regain its independence in the midst of the fall of the Union. Soviet in 1991.
Lawyer and former legislator of the European Parliament, she is the daughter of Siim Kallas, one of the creators of the reformist party, former prime minister and former European Union commissioner.
Kaja Kallas took the reins of the Reform Party in 2018 as its first female president. Her first cabinet will also see women in other key positions, as Keit Pentus-Rosimannus of Reform takes over as finance minister and diplomat Eva-Maria Liimets becomes foreign minister.
The government formation marks the second such attempt for Kallas in less than two years, as it failed to achieve a government led by the Reform Party after the 2019 elections. This paved the way for the rival’s central party and the its leader, Juri Ratas, to form a tripartite coalition without the Reform Party.
Ratas and his cabinet resigned on January 13 over a scandal involving a key official in his central party suspected of accepting a private donation for the party in exchange for a political favor in a real estate development in the capital’s port district. , Tallinn.
The Ratas government, which took office in April 2019, was unstable from the start, as the coalition included the populist EKRE, the nation’s third party participating in a nationalist, anti-immigration and anti-immigration agenda. -EU.
The strong rhetoric of EKRE leaders Mart Helme and his son Martin Helme created several embarrassing situations for the Rats government with public statements that were considered insulting to Estonia’s international allies and tarnished the country’s image. which brought the government to the brink of collapse at least twice.
Kallas immediately ruled out including EKRE in his cabinet, citing considerable differences in values. The Reform Party defines itself on its website as “the leader of the liberal worldview in Estonia.”
The perceived damage caused by the right of EKRE to the image of Estonia is so severe that Kallas previously acknowledged to the Estonian media that his cabinet would undertake a diplomatic mission to restore confidence among the country’s allies Estonia’s new political course.
Ratas, Prime Minister of Estonia since November 2016, will not be part of the new cabinet. Local media reported earlier that he could become parliamentary speaker in March.
Estonia has been a member of the European Union and NATO since 2004.
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This story has been corrected to show that there are 15 cabinet members, not 14.