Estonian parlt fails to elect president

  • 2016-08-30
  • BNS/TBT Staff

TALLINN - Estonia’s parliament was unable to elect the nation’s next president on Tuesday as neither of the two remaining candidates in today's runoff earned the 68 votes necessary to be elected.

The job of electing the head of state will now be forwarded to an electoral college made up of all 101 members of the parliament and 234 representatives of local government councils.

In the runoff, Siim Kallas, European Commission vice president between 2004 and 2014, got 42 votes and Mailis Reps, deputy chairman of the opposition Centre Party group in parliament, received 26 votes. Thirty ballots remained with neither box checked.

In the second balloting round in the parliament held at noon today, the number of votes cast for Kallas was 45 and the number of votes cast for Reps was 32. Former Chancellor of Justice Allar Joks, the third candidate in the second round of the presidential election, finished last with 21 votes. There was one ballot with no field checked.

In the first round of presidential election in the Riigikogu yesterday, Allar Joks earned 25 votes; Eiki Nestor, speaker of the parliament, 40 votes; and Mailis Reps 26 votes. There were eight ballots with no boxes checked.

By law, the speaker of the Riigikogu must now assemble an electoral body consisting of 101 MPs and 234 representatives of local government councils to elect the president.