Estonian Parliamentary Election, 3rd March 2019

[IceAgeComing]

Around a month away: I'll do a more detailed effort post on the background of the election as far as I can gather soon.  Because I'm lazy I'm going to copy and paste my post on it from AAD.

So as Latvia settles down; we shift towards another Baltic election as Estonia votes in early March. I'll try to post a big post on this in the future but in quick summary: in 2015 the Reform Party (the liberal party; one of the primary forces behind Estonia's very liberal economic policies) topped the poll and managed to form a coalition with the Social Democrats (who're questionably social democratic; although they were willing in the past to resign from government or let themselves be sacked so they aren't totally spineless) and Pro Patria (a right wing party who're the subject of a merger between two parties that were the typical Baltic new hot things for a while before dying). In 2016 after the three parties didn't get on the junior partners booted out Reform and instead formed a government with the Centre Party (who're also a Liberal party; tend to be more to the left, more populist and get a large chunk of their support from the Russian minority which is why they were treated like Harmony for a long time until they knifed long time leader Edgar Savisaar for someone more popular with the other parties) under Jüri Ratas. Not much has really changed in terms of government policy I think: I admit to not following Estonia quite as closely as I should but I'll try to read up a little if I have time between work stuff.

Estonian polling is of dubious value: the current opinion polls all show generally a close contest between both Reform and the Centre Party for the position of biggest party and between government and opposition.

The main change is the growth of EKRE who're a... rather dodgy right-wing populist party with links to not very nice groups in America - perhaps one of their more memorable things was advocating for "the correct teaching" of the Nazi occupation. In the last election they got around 8% of the vote and finished sixth; in this election they're polling at near 20% and are the clear third place party behind the big two. The main issue for the government is that both their junior partners have fallen in support quite strongly: the Social Democrats are around 10% and Pro Patria are polling near the threshold of 5%. There are a couple of other parties worth keeping an eye on: E200 is one of those weird technocratic mass movement type deals which is probably comically corrupt: former Pro Patria leader Margus Tsahkna has joined them and seems to be their only real big name; and the Greens have flirted with the threshold at times and seem to be the only Green party in the region that actually cares about the environment and isn't obviously just the machine of a rich person which is probably why they've not been in the Estonian parliament since 2011.

I'm also pretty sure that Estonia is the only EU country where the top two parties are members of the same European Party - Centre and Reform are both members of ALDE. Doesn't mean that they get on with each other though!

[_]

So apparently there are the normal Greens (Estonian Greens), and Richness of Life which is another Green party?  I don't understand why Richness of Life exists, they'll probably just stop the regular Greens from breaking the threshold...

[IceAgeComing]

So apparently there are the normal Greens (Estonian Greens), and Richness of Life which is another Green party?  I don't understand why Richness of Life exists, they'll probably just stop the regular Greens from breaking the threshold...

They exist because their leader (Artur Talvik; he led the Free Party list at the last election despite not being a party member, then he joined and became leader, and then he resigned to form his own party: which is entirely typical for the region - as is him not standing as the parties PM candidate for some reason) wanted his own political force and for no other reason.  The region historically has had a lot of these sort of parties (weird vague populist centrist parties who stand for nice sounding things like direct democracy or anti-corruption: and then inevitably die when it turns out they don't practice what they preach) and I'd less look at their stated ideology and more where their leaders came from.

From what I can gather they aren't polling well at all so they may well not get anywhere close - the voting system in Estonia lets people vote for candidates and if an individual candidate gets enough votes to win a seat then they get in despite thresholds: and since Talvik is their only candidate of note he might just get in by himself.

[Diouf]

Centre Party prefers current coalition to continue. However, Pro Patria might find it to awkward to continue the centre-left cooperation:

You must be logged in to read this quote.

https://news.err.ee/908098/simson-coalition-with-sde-pro-patria-first-choice-of-centre-party

[DavidB.]

Even if the government does win a majority, it would seem very unwise for Pro Patria to continue with Center and SDE, unless they want to be annihilated electorally by EKRE and Reform.

[Diouf]

The Interior Ministry has calculated the new distribution of seats between multi-member constituencies. 958,571 persons are eligible to vote.

valimisringkond nr 1 (Tallinna Haabersti, Põhja-Tallinn ja Kristiine) – 10 mandaati;
valimisringkond nr 2 (Tallinna Kesklinna, Lasnamäe ja Pirita) – 13 mandaati;
valimisringkond nr 3 (Tallinna Mustamäe ja Nõmme) – 8 mandaati;
valimisringkond nr 4 (Harju- ja Raplamaa) – 15 mandaati;
valimisringkond nr 5 ( Hiiu-, Lääne- ja Saaremaa) – 6 mandaati;
valimisringkond nr 6 (Lääne-Virumaa) – 5 mandaati;
valimisringkond nr 7 (Ida-Virumaa) – 7 mandaati;
valimisringkond nr 8 (Järva- ja Viljandimaa) – 7 mandaati;
valimisringkond nr 9 (Jõgeva- ja Tartumaa) – 7 mandaati;
valimisringkond nr 10 (Tartu linn) – 8 mandaati;
valimisringkond nr 11 (Võru-, Valga- ja Põlvamaa) – 8 mandaati;
valimisringkond nr 12 (Pärnumaa) – 7 mandaati.

Two of the Tallinn constituencies (1 & 2) as well as the constituency surrounding Talinn (4) all gain a seat while the constituency 9 (around Tartu), 11 (South-East) and 12 (Pärnu) all lose a seat.

[IceAgeComing]

EKRE is clearly where Pro Patria are worried about their votes going; certainly being involved in government while the UN migration pact is a thing isn't helping them.  Although Reform also would have supported it so in some ways they'd be in the same situation regardless and there were reasons why they booted Reform out of office earlier on.

[DavidB.]

That's a hell of a gender gap.
https://twitter.com/EuropeElects/status/1100136535423414272

At 8 PM yesterday, 21.5% had already voted early.

[Diouf]

Leading party by constituency, although several of them are very tight. The Centre Party is ahead in the three Tallinn constituencies and Ida-Virumaa. Reform party leads in Tartu and the 4 Central constituencies. Reform and EKRE tied in the constituency surrounding Tartu, and EKRE ahead in the South-East and the Western islands constituency.

[Diouf]

There is speculation about a coalition between Centre and Reform after the election.
Reform PM candidate Kaja Kallas says that there that are "three big issues. The rest of the topics can be negotiated. But in matters of principle, we won't compromise,". Kallas also repeats that EKRE is the only party, she will not negotiate with.
The three big issues are taxation, citizenship and language in schools.
The Reform Party is opposed to the progressive taxation elements introduced by the current government. The Reform Party wants to keep the current citizenship system, while Centre wants to open up for some forms of expedited naturalisation, especially in the case of people of families who have resided in Estonia for an extended amount of time. Where the Centre Party is leaning towards keeping up Estonia's Russian schools, the Reform Party wants an entirely Estonian-based education system, starting as early as nursery school.

https://news.err.ee/914570/kallas-tax-citizenship-schools-main-obstacles-to-centre-reform-coalition

[DavidB.]

Almost 40% have already voted early (many of them online), up from 33% in 2015. Reform overperform in the early and online vote, Center and EKRE on election day.

The last Kantar poll has Reform at 27%, Center at 25% and EKRE down four points at 17%.

[Diouf]

ERR editor Dario Cavegn predict a Centre-Reform coalition.

This editor's prediction is now what it was two years ago: that we are inevitably gravitating towards a coalition of the Centre Party and the Reform Party.

A deal between political dinosaurs Edgar Savisaar (Centre) and Siim Kallas (Reform) might have made the latter president in 2016, but failed against opposition in both parties: enough of the old guard, not another round of that ever-same late-1990s stand-off.

But this failed attempt at consolidation was followed by Centre's swiftly getting rid of Savisaar, replacing him with Jüri Ratas, which catapulted it into the political limelight and made Mr Ratas prime minister within just a short time.

Now, in early 2019, one may well think the two parties could actually help each other, whether they like it or not: Centre, still disorganised and not quite done yet with its own housekeeping, could do with an experienced partner.

In turn, there seem to be plenty of people in the Reform Party who would welcome the opportunity to do things slightly differently, ie without the 1990s neoconservative dogma of Isamaa's tax and social policy hanging over their heads. In this sense, going into government together, though unthinkable until just a short time ago, would give both parties room to breathe and develop.

Another detail is that while Reform could have made Centre's frozen agreement with United Russia an issue again, it didn't. In fact, the matter hardly surfaced, even in the final phase of the campaign. This may be a sign that Reform regarding a potential coalition is at least keeping its options open.

A Centre-Reform government could be both interdependent and sober enough to tackle Estonia's current issues, from tax policy to healthcare to business and infrastructure and transport. In a nutshell, it is this combination that would have both the political potential as well as the real-life power in parliament to redefine Estonia's course—while in any other combination, the muddling-through would likely continue.

https://news.err.ee/916096/editor-s-prediction-centre-to-win-form-next-government-with-reform-party

[Tender Branson]

It's interesting how turnout in Eastern Europe rises, once countries and their people get wealthier ...

Turnout could hit 70% today, up from 58% in the 2000s.

It has been steadily rising.

[FredLindq]

If ER is the strongest party we will have a great coalition ER+EK or ER+SDE+I like Taavi Rõivas' second cabinet. If EK is the largest party we will have a great coalition EK+ER or EK+SDE+I like the current guvernment. All this since ER has said that they cant cooperate with EKRE.

[DavidB.]

It's interesting how turnout in Eastern Europe rises, once countries and their people get wealthier ...

Seems to have much more to do with the extensive possibilities for early voting in Estonia, which are increasingly well-known to the public.

Slovenia and Poland are among the more wealthy countries in Central and Eastern Europe and also among the countries that have the lowest turnout (Bulgaria has higher turnout than Poland). Montenegro, on the other hand, has pretty decent turnout (in the 70s). Turnout in many places in Western Ukraine tends to be in the high 70s; across the border, in much richer Slovakia and Poland, it is much lower.

Turnout mostly seems to be negatively affected by a) extensive corruption and b) the existence of a broad sense that ideology doesn't play a real and meaningful role in politics - of course, the two are interconnected. Hungary had high very high turnout by CEE standards (70%) because the ideological difference between Fidesz and the opposition was so clear. On the other hand, widespread clientelism can also drive up turnout (suspecting this is the case in Montenegro).

Countries that have more "fluid" party systems seem to have lower turnout too, as voters are less connected to parties. But this doesn't explain all cases (such as relatively low turnout in Poland, where corruption is relatively low compared to other countries in the region, ideology matters, and the party system isn't all that fluid).

[DavidB.]

Turnout at 12 was 47% compared to 42% in 2015.

[DavidB.]

57.2% had voted at 4 PM compared to 56% in 2015. Kind of disappointing that the promising turnout increase seems to be evaporating on e-day.

Low turnout on e-day should be good news for Reform, who overperformed by a lot in the early vote, and bad news for Center and especially EKRE.

[PetrSokol]

Is somewhere pls the live tv coverage?

[DavidB.]

Compared to 2015, turnout in Ida-Viru county at 4 PM was down by 6 points at 41.6%. This is the Center stronghold in the northeast of the country, bordering Russia and harboring many ethnic Russians. Lack of enthusiasm for Center among Russians after their stint in government?

[DavidB.]

Is somewhere pls the live tv coverage?

No idea, but results should appear here. ERR.ee should have live coverage. Polls are closing in 10 minutes.

[Diouf]

E-vote results should be the first to come. They looked like this in 2015:

Reform Party 37,5% (2015 election overall: 27,7%)
Pro Patria and Res Publica (IRL) 17,2% (13,7%)
Social Democratic Party (SDE) 16,9% (15,2%)
Free Party 12% (8,7%)
Centre Party 7,7% (24,8%)
Conservative People’s Party (EKRE) 6,9% (8,1%)

Polls should close now, right? But the watch at ERR seems to count down with an additional hour?

[DavidB.]

Polls have now closed according to ERR. But there will be no exit poll and the hall behind the reporter seems empty, so perhaps the party just starts a bit later.

In the meantime I found this Election Compass. The options range from completely agree to completely disagree (from left to right), with "no opinion" as the farthest option on the right.

My result:

EKRE 73%
Free Party (Vabaerakond) 69%
Pro Patria (Isamaa) 69%
Reform 62%
Eesti 200 61%
Richness of Life 59%
Center 55%
Green 54%
Social Democrats 50%



Without pluses and minuses for the importance of statements they are all between 56% and 67% agreed, with the Greens and the SocDems at 56% and Eesti 200 at 67%.

[DavidB.]

Apparently Reform leading candidate Kaja Kallas just did a 180 on whether Center is their preferred coalition partner. Kallas now says they're not. They also exclude EKRE, so I wonder what they think would be their alternative path to 51.

[Diouf]

Apparently Reform leading candidate Kaja Kallas just did a 180 on whether Center is their preferred coalition partner. Kallas now says they're not.

Did they state that it would be their preferred partner beforehand? I just saw her ruling out EKRE as a coalition partner. Which basically leaves Centre, or a return to SDE+Isamaa if E200 does not come in. Would not be particularly clever if they ruled out one of them as well.

[DavidB.]

Apparently Reform leading candidate Kaja Kallas just did a 180 on whether Center is their preferred coalition partner. Kallas now says they're not.

Did they state that it would be their preferred partner beforehand? I just saw her ruling out EKRE as a coalition partner. Which basically leaves Centre, or a return to SDE+Isamaa if E200 does not come in. Would not be particularly clever if they ruled out one of them as well.

Hmm, I thought so, but can't find it anymore. Perhaps it was not a 180 after all.

Center prefer a continuation of their coalition with SDE and Pro Patria.

This should be the internet vote. As expected, but Center somewhat weaker and Reform somewhat stronger:

Reform 40%
EKRE 13.5%
Pro Patria 12.6%
Centre Party 11.7%
Social Democrats 11.4%
Estonia 200 5.5%

In 2015 this was:

Reform 37.5%
Pro Patria 17.2%
Social Democrats 16.9%
Free Party 12%
Centre 7.7%
EKRE 6.9%