VILNIUS - Since no one party - even no two parties - have so far failed to gather enough seats for a ruling majority in the new Parliament, the six political factions that passed the 5 percent threshold in the proportional voting segment of the election have started mulling over possible coalitions.
The current frontrunner is Working for Lithuania - the coalition of Social Democrats and Social Liberals that finished in second and has run the country for over three years and forged the fastest-growing economy in Europe in 2003. Both the Labor Party, which took first place, and the Homeland Union (the Conservatives), which has sworn never to cooperate with the Laborites, are hoping to woo Working for Lithuania and hobble together a new government.
The leaders of Working for Lithuania, Prime Minister Algirdas Brazauskas and Parliamentary Chairman Arturas Paulauskas, believe they have the greatest chance of forming a ruling coalition for the second time in a row.
Brazauskas said on Oct. 12 that he would not consider a coalition with the Laborites and their leader, Russian-born Viktor Uspaskich, unless he was given the prime minister's chair.
Indeed, prior to the elections, opinion polls showed that while the Labor Party was the most popular party, most voters would like to see Brazauskas maintain his post.
Though with several dozen seats yet to be determined in single-mandate districts, speculation was rife as to who would wed whom. For his part, Uspaskich, who had been reluctant to speak about possible coalitions before the election, spoke more candidly after the poll. He said he believed that all political parties demonstrated similar ideas, and therefore negotiations could be conducted with anyone except the Homeland Union and the Rolandas Paksas-led Liberal Democrat Party.
He stressed that professional skills, not the program, would be the major requirement for a future coalition partner.
Brazauskas also said he saw no possibility of cooperating with the Liberal Democrats after Paksas' disgraceful impeachment earlier this year.
But Uspaskich implied that the Laborites should be the kingmakers in the next coalitional government and should have the right to appoint the prime minister. Asked if he would seek the top post, he said that the party's administrative commitee would decide.
He did add, however, that he "would not make the worst prime minister."
A more complex possibility, the so-called rainbow coalition involving the coalition of Brazauskas and Paulauskas, the conservatives and the liberal centrists, was also discussed intensively, since this would keep the populist Laborites out of the Cabinet of Ministers. However, any such coalition is based on the assumption that the three parties could have approximately the same number of mandates as the Labor Party after the second round.
The Conservatives, desperate to keep the much-feared Uspaskich out of power, are even prepared to support the left-wing parties in the single-mandate districts. Pau-lauskas admitted that as Conservatives have shown to be reasonable in the opposition on the national level, there is a strong possibility to negotiate with them over some left-wing provisions.
Ceslovas Jursenas, the Social Democrats' top candidate, said he was also prepared to find an agreement with right-wing forces.
"Some of the right-wing parties have been pushing the election campaign to the left so strongly that sometimes it appeared that we are being pushed to the right. Why would there be a problem to find an agreement with them if they sincerely declare left-wing ideas more acceptable?" Jursenas asked.
But Brazauskas has previously expressed strong doubts on the prosperous existence of such a left-wing, right-wing partnership. Uspaskich also ridiculed the prospect, deriding it as an "anti-Labor" agreement.
"It's possible to form a similar government, and it's possible to agree on it, but then one will have to work - they will have to work themselves. Any such government compiled with ideologically different cardinal parties will simply be unstable. I don't know who could find it useful," Uspaskich said.
Political analysts, however, agree that the coalition of traditional parties could be the best solution to a new situation.
"This version [of oppositional political parties] would be healthier for Lithuania. The representatives of the Labor Party should remain on the bench," said Alvidas Lukosaitis, political analyst and professor at the Institute of International Relations and Political Science.
"The Labor Party will bring a lot of new people to the Seimas (Lithuania's parliament), but this does not primarily mean that we are expecting big changes. This means that the Seimas' work will slow down - the new parliamentary generation lacks experience," said political analyst Lauras Bielinis. "They will spend more time learning than working for real."
Right-wing parties haven't yet lost hope of becoming the most desired bride and are hoping to increase their mandates by 37 seats. Leader of the Liberal and Center Union Arturas Zuokas, who is also Vilnius mayor, pointed out that the party performed its best during the single mandate districts of the 2000 parliamentary elections.
Meanwhile, both the Liberal Centrists and the Conservatives maintained that they would not form a ruling majority with either the Labor Party or Paksas' coalition.
