The new Prime Minister Evika Siliņa (JV) will be able to fire the minister for including persons subject to sanctions in the decision-making process, according to the cooperation agreement signed by the parties forming the government approved on Friday.
The new Prime Minister Evika Siliņa (JV) will be able to fire the minister for including persons subject to sanctions in the decision-making process, according to the cooperation agreement signed by the parties forming the government approved on Friday.
The cooperation agreement signed by “New Unity”, “Progressives” and the Union of Greens and Farmers is almost a copy of the cooperation agreement of the previous coalition and the differences in the text of the agreement are only in certain sections.
The chapter on general principles of cooperation, compared to the previous coalition agreement, contains two additional points. One of the provisions is that cooperation partners must act in accordance with the principles of good corporate governance, while the second innovation in this section is a disclaimer that cooperation partners are not bound by contracts or agreements unilaterally concluded by other cooperation partners with non-governmental organizations, political organizations (parties) and their associations and to other natural or legal persons.
Unlike the cooperation agreement concluded at the beginning of the work of the previous government, the clause of the cooperation rules on different votes has lost its specificity. The parties that formed the second government of Krišjānias Kariņa (JV) had agreed that partners respect each other’s right to vote differently, prior to collegial consultation and reaching a consensus on expanding the rights of unmarried spouses, ratifying the Istanbul Convention, lowering the threshold for initiating a referendum, changing the Saeima election system and family strengthening the concept. Meanwhile, the agreement of the coalition led by Silina does not include specific issues on which the partners may have different opinions.
In order to probably avoid the question of Aivars Lemberg’s influence, which has caused a lot of criticism and concern, the cooperation partners have agreed on another criterion according to which the prime minister can request the minister’s resignation. If previously this could basically be done if the minister had performed poorly or lost trust, now the prime minister will have the right to dismiss the minister if a member of the Cabinet of Ministers or his representative, within the framework of his competence assigned by law, involved in the decision-making persons to whom any international and national laws of the Republic of Latvia apply. sanctions provided for in the Sanctions Act.
The cooperation agreement of the new coalition differs from the agreement of the previous coalition with a new appendix – a memorandum on the work to be done urgently, which must be completed by the end of this year. The partners have agreed that this memorandum is an integral part of the cooperation agreement. With this memorandum, the partners have committed to introduce mechanisms for partial compensation of the increase in tariffs of electricity distribution networks, to improve bank competition, to introduce solutions for a wider offer of mortgage loan refinancing services and to eliminate administrative and financial restrictions on the transfer of customers between credit institutions, to introduce a bank profit tax, to ratify the Council of Europe Convention on Violence against Women and the prevention and combating of domestic violence, to strengthen the regulation of cohabitation of couples, as well as to develop a sustainable education financing model.
It has already been reported that the majority of the Saeima today approved the new government headed by Prime Minister Evikas Silina (JV). 53 MPs voted for the new government.
In the new government, those already working in the previous Cabinet of Ministers have retained their positions – Minister of Finance Arvils Asheradens (JV), Minister of Justice Inese Lībiņa-Egnere (JV) and Minister of Education and Science Anda Čakša (JV).
Krišjānis Kariņš (JV), the former acting minister and head of the previous government, has been officially confirmed as the Minister of Foreign Affairs. Saeima deputy Rihards Kozlovskis (JV) has returned to the position of Minister of the Interior after a break of several years.
Following the decision of the Saeima, the former chairman of the Kuldīga County Council, member of the Saeima Inga Bērziņa (JV) has become the minister of environmental protection and regional development. On the other hand, the position of Minister of Health has been entrusted to a doctor, member of the Saeima, Hossam Abu Meri (JV).
Viktors Valainis, the chairman of the Saeima faction of this political power, has been confirmed from the ZZS as the minister of economy, as the minister of agriculture – the member of the Saeima Armands Krauze (ZZS), as the minister of welfare – the former minister of welfare, member of the Saeima Uldis Augulis (ZZS), and as the minister of climate and energy – parliamentarian Kaspars Melnis (ZZS).
From the “Progressives”, the director of the Riga Cinema Museum of the Latvian Academy of Culture, Riga City Council member Agnese Logina (P) has been confirmed as the minister of culture, Andris Sprūds (P), the chairman of the European Affairs Commission of the Saeima, will be the defense minister, and Kaspars, the head of the “Progressive” Saeima faction, will be the minister of traffic. Brisken.
