The popularity of politicians sunk to an all time low as a new survey revealed that 40 percent of people had no party preference at all. All parties lost support in the survey, carried out by research company Faktum and Ariko pollsters.
"There was no difference between the ruling coalition and the opposition parties in the public's eyes. The parties with the stronger support lost more supporters and those with lower support lost fewer, but the tendency was the same in each case," political scientist Anu Toots told Pealinn.
The Center Party had 26.4 percentage points in April, down 5 percent. The Reform Party won 13.5 down, from 16 percent. The Pro Patria (For Country in Latin) and Res Publica Union hit 8.6 percent in March and 5.4 percent in April. The Social Democrats garnered 6.4 percent in March and only 3.6 percent in April. The Greens had 2.4 percent supports down one percentage point.
Support for parties was strongest in Tallinn despite political analysts' assessment that Mayor Edgar Saavisar is unpopular. "The share of people who would not go to the polls at all has not changed much in three months," Toots said.
According to analysts, political parties are unpopular due to the worsening state of the economy. Inflation hit a record high of 16.4 percent and housing prices have fallen by up to 20 percent.
Political corruption, greed and mismanagement at local and national levels are also factors in the unpopularity of politicians.
Members of parliament are paying themselves is 4 to 5 times more than the average salary. This arrangement has caused widespread criticism from the press and public Opinion polls show 80 percent of Estonians are unhappy with how much MPs are paid.
A string of local political scandals has damaged the reputation of politicians nationwide. The mayor of Parnu caused a scandal when he borrowed large sums of money that he planned to pay back by selling off the city's housing stock. He did not anticipate the collapse in the house price.
The unpopularity of politicians is observable at grass roots levels.
Party activist for the Social Democratic party Siret Luusk said that she has noticed a difference in opinion when she is campaigning for her party door to door.
She puts the unpopularity of all the political parties down to poor economic management and the rising cost of living. "Recently, there was the rising land tax. People were collecting signatures against it," she said.
Luusk said that politicians do not want to admit that the country faces major problems.
"Politicians are not really doing anything about the budget crisis," she said.
Senior politicians such as Mart Laar said that politicians must behave with decorum in parliament if they wanted to win back public respect. According to a EuroBarometer survey last fall, only 46 percent of citizens trusted parliament and only 22 percent of people had confidence in the political parties.
