Deputy mayor of Tallinn to resign

TALLINN - Tallinn Deputy Mayor Priit Vilba of the Reform Party, who has drawn criticism from several parties, this week handed in his resignation to Mayor Juri Mois.

"It is clear that I have remained in the way of powerful forces involved in obscure business and power games and I am being used as a pretext in attacks against the Reform Party.

"It's clear to anyone who reads the papers that I have become the target and it is no longer possible for me to do any substantial work. In the future all my steam would go to proving that I'm not guilty," Vilba said in a statement to the press.

Vilba said that the accusations against him are groundless.

"I am convinced that a security police inquiry will show inconsistency and consequently malignancy of the accusations published in the press," he said.

Vilba asked the mayor why he had involved his friend Meelis Lao in the organization of affairs of the city, why he was so consistently pressing for the sale of the port area to one bidder and why he continued to claim that privatization of Tallinna Vesi (Tallinn Water Company) had been carried out correctly and in the best possible way for the city's citizens.

Vilba claims that Mois violated the State Procurements Act in drawing up the city's strategic development plan.

"Why hasn't the mayor dared to admit that the idea of building an underground car park and cutting down Tallinn's lime trees was actually conceived by himself and his party colleagues?" Vilba asked.

Vilba admitted that he had certainly made mistakes. "But only those who do not do anything, don't make mistakes. When they have been found, I have always tried to correct them," he said.