Hope and change

In late May, President Valdis Zatlers stunned Latvia by announcing a referendum on dissolving the Saeima, accusing the legislature of falling under the sway of oligarchs. A few days later the legislature voted Zatlers out of the presidency, spurring the creation of the Zatlers Reform Party for the September 17 polls. Philip Birzulis spoke to Mr. Zatlers about oligarchs, coalitions and healthcare.

Your speech in May ordering a referendum to dissolve the Saeima could be described as “ten minutes that shook the nation.” How do you feel right now as the person who has triggered all of these processes in Latvia?
My main goal was to shatter the political elite, to make them responsible for their decisions in everyday life – not just six months before elections. What has been really surprising has been the high level of responsiveness from many individuals. There has been an awakening in the minds of people, a readiness to go for change. In the month after my speech I received many emails, phone calls and letters from ordinary people and NGOs, and I think it has triggered a wave of participation. It is a process which is simply called “change.”

Some have said that your motives in starting this process weren’t so idealistic – you saw that you wouldn’t be re-elected as president and this was a calculated political move.
That is too simple to be the truth. You can find the answer in the result and participation level in the referendum. Forty-four percent of eligible voters participated in the referendum, the second highest figure in the last 20 years. Nearly 95 percent voted for new elections. This is a demand from society and citizens and it is their choice and their vote.

The trigger for your decision to call the referendum was the refusal by the Saeima to lift the immunity of Ainars Slesers, whose financial dealings were being investigated. However, Mr. Slesers says that in the weeks before your decision you had cordial relations with him, you had conversations with him at social events. Mr. Slesers says that the talk about oligarchs appeared out of nowhere.
As president, I had a tradition of sending my congratulations to MPs when they became new parents. And I did this with Slesers when his son was born. That’s one side of the matter. The other side is that it is never too late to say no to oligarchs. It’s never too late to say no to corruption. And you have to win this fight, because it is a never ending fight. The fight against the oligarchs and corruption here in Latvia has not been won yet. It is in progress, and the elections are one of the weapons in the fight, by not voting for oligarch parties and getting them out of political power.

But you yourself were brought into power by the oligarchs, and now you are fighting them.
If you mean how I myself was elected as president, I am fully aware of who was behind this election process and how it was done, because I was the candidate. But when you become president, you have to serve your country. I was chosen as a neutral candidate, as a political outsider, because that was what the population demanded. This was how they decided to bridge the gap between the ruling parties and the population. But when you become president, you have to serve the nation and the demands of the population.

In this election campaign there has been a lot of mud thrown at you. You say that you are against corruption, but your opponents claim to have uncovered excessive spending on your apartment while you were president and that your family got free business class tickets on airBaltic.
Of course these are political tools used to fight against me. But if we are more realistic, it is clear that presidents don’t buy, personally, anything and these things are not for their personal use. They are for representation purposes and for special events. So nothing is connected with me personally and there is nothing unusual about the residence being furnished after reconstruction. With the tickets, if you order the tickets and then pay the bill and you fly – that’s not unusual, it’s everyday practice. But, of course, airBaltic is in trouble and they have losses and Mr. Flick is hiding in Germany instead of coming here. And if someone is hiding, then something is wrong. So he throws back the ball and says, the president was flying on airBaltic. Of course the president flew on airBaltic - it’s the national airline - and any national airline would be pleased to have the president fly with them! But I only flew with them once or twice a year, so I’m sorry to say that I wasn’t a frequent flyer! As the president I was a frequent flyer, but not as a private person.

When you dissolved the Parliament many assumed that you would seek to become prime minister yourself. Why haven’t you done this?
There are two reasons. Firstly, I want to bring in a new generation, people between 30 and 40 years of age, with life experience, good education and families, who are eager to rebuild the state for their kids. Secondly, in my four year term as president I spent a lot of time creating proposals for changing the political system, including constitutional amendments and legislative amendments and other laws. Most of these proposals are still on the shelf. Neither the 9th nor the 10th Saeima voted for them, except one – the right of the people to collect signatures and dissolve the Saeima. So I believe that my role is to be in the Saeima and continue pushing for these changes which are vital for Latvia.

There is a perception that your new faces have been badly hurt in public debates with other politicians, for example Aivars Lembergs. Mr. Lembergs is a tough, experienced man – can a bunch of new faces really stand up to him?
Excuse me, but in the first debate on Radio SWH, Lembergs lost to our candidate for prime minister, Edmunds Sprudzs, because Lembergs was not prepared. He thought that Sprudzs is just a young, inexperienced guy and he lost the debate. We have to understand that there is a choice between two options – to follow the rules of oligarchy or to change. To bring about change, you need people who are not involved in this system.

But you are going to have to form a coalition with people who are in the system, perhaps with Unity or Harmony Center. How do you see that panning out?
If you want change, you need to develop a program, and we have done a lot of work on our program. We have set out three priorities: firstly, changing the political system, secondly, reforming the tax system, developing the economy and improving higher and professional education, and thirdly the demographic situation. Now the most difficult task is to make people believe in our program. Sustainable growth of the economy, sustainable growth of education, sustainable growth of population and a sustainable pension system.

Regarding the course that Latvia is going to take over the next few years, there seem to be clear differences between the major parties in this election. On the one hand, Unity is in favor of continuing the Dombrovskis reforms – tough fiscal policy, budget consolidation. On the other hand, Harmony Center says that this is too fast, we have to slow down the consolidation, the budget is being balanced at great human cost. Which course do you think Latvia should follow?
Definitely the Dombrovskis economic recovery program. All the other options are irresponsible. We have to have a balanced budget in 2013 and a maximum budget deficit of 2.5 percent in 2012, and we have to join the euro in 2014. They are the same goals as those of Prime Minister Dombrovskis.

Is a coalition between Unity and the Zatlers Reform Party the most likely outcome after the elections?
It depends on the vote of the citizens, because they will decide how many seats in the Saeima each party will have. We have only drawn one red line – we will not go into coalition with oligarch-led parties. We will not deal with Slesers or Lembergs, although Slesers’ party may not be in the Saeima anyway. We will talk to all of the parties, and the talks will be based on how much they support our program.

Aren’t you just dividing the electorate of Unity?
We are not. I am convinced that Unity alone would get fewer votes than Unity plus the Reform Party.

Can Latvia’s corruption problems be solved by removing the figures that you call oligarchs? Or does the cancer run deeper into society, and what can be done about it?
It goes very deeply into society. Cutting off the heads of the oligarchs is the first step. We have to reduce the size of the grey economy and bring in simple, transparent rules in the business environment.

Before you went into politics you were a prominent surgeon. As a person who lives in Latvia, I can tell you that the medical system is a mess. People are dying from mis-diagnoses, people are being denied treatment because they don’t have money to pay the doctors. This is reality. If you get into power, what are your plans for the healthcare system?
The professional level of physicians and nurses in Latvia is pretty high, but the system is very badly organized. We have to give more power to local communities in organizing primary care, not only giving them responsibilities, but also funding in accordance with the number of inhabitants in each local community. Communities are so diverse that it is impossible to have the same system to ensure accessibility and quality of services everywhere. On the other hand, the state has to take 100 percent responsibility for all the emergency hospitals in Latvia, of which there are approximately 12. This would improve spending in the healthcare system because although spending is low it could still be spent much more efficiently. Realistically, over the next two or three years there will not be much increase in healthcare funding, so we have to really think about how we use this money.