Latvian Prime Minister Evika Silina has resigned along with her government
Latvian Prime Minister Evika Silina has submitted her resignation to the Saeima.
The entire government has resigned along with her.
The previous evening, Interior Minister Rihards Kozlovskis of the New Unity party had stated that Silina had no plans to resign.
However, on Thursday morning, Andris Šuvajevs, leader of the “Progressives” faction in the Saeima, stated that if a vote of no confidence in Silina took place that day, the government would fall.
The opposition planned to secure the Prime Minister’s resignation by unconventional means.
The Seimas’s rules of procedure stipulate that a motion of no confidence may be adopted at a regular sitting no earlier than five days after the draft resolution has been submitted.
However, MPs wanted to take advantage of the unfinished sitting of 7 May and support one of the motions regarding Silina that had already been included on the agenda. This would have allowed them to table a motion of no confidence immediately, without waiting five days.
In the morning, at the Prime Minister’s request, a one-hour break was announced until 10:00.
When the session resumed, the Speaker of the Seimas did not explain the reasons for the break. It was expected that Silina would address parliament.
However, the Prime Minister did not address the Sejm, but held a press conference at the Cabinet of Ministers, where she announced her resignation.
What led up to this
On 13 May, the liberal “Progressives” party, which was the junior partner in the governing coalition, stated that it saw no possibility of continuing to work in Silina’s government.
The party called on the Prime Minister to resign and on the President to begin consultations on forming a new government.
The “Progressives” were also outraged by Silini’s harsh statement, made at the last minute before their announcement. The party claimed they had not been warned about this.
A separate cause for dissatisfaction was that the “Progressives” had effectively been stripped of one of their three ministerial portfolios, with a military specialist being proposed for the post of defence minister.
As reported by ThePublic, Latvia’s defence minister resigned following incidents involving Ukrainian drones.
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