Alatalu: Kaljulaid's independence may lead to conflict with Estonia's top politicians
Conflicts could arise between President-elect Kersti Kaljulaid and the government as well as other top politicians due to the fact that Kaljulaid has not participated in Estonia's day-to-day domestic politics, political observer and former politician Toomas Alatalu found.
"That can be predicted, because she hasn't participated in party politics," Alatalu told a BNS correspondent in the Riigikogu on Monday.
"Unfortunately, were are in the kind of situation where these people that are in the Riigikogu imagine that they constitute all of Estonian politics and everything must go the way they have [done things] once decided," he said.
"In a sense it was positive that, after the scruntinizing of politicians, a non-politician entered the arena," continued the former politician. "This is very positive in that she is free in a sense. She does not depend on the so-called back rooms."
Alatalu also pointed out that the people surrounding Kaljulaid in recent days who the same people in presidental candidate Allar Jõks' team, which allows one to presume that Kaljulaid's positions are consistent with those of Jõks.
"Our president must be the one who brings the third sector or civil society into the decision-making process in addition to politicians, who have actually been absent from policy-making for practically ten yers already." he commented. "Let me remind you that [former president] Arnold Rüütel was the man who attempted to reach agreement in society — which was rejected. Now hopefully were will return to it, because after all this is necessitated by the world that has changed, by the changed international situation. We must be more consolidated and more cooperative with each other than ever before."
Kaljulaid stressed in her remarks to the media after the Monday's elections that, as president, she will try to solve the various conflicts and difficult faced by the people of Estonia. "It will definitely be my task to see to it that Estonia was less black-and-white. That we all spoke with one another and that we all understood that solutions usually lie somewhere in between," she said.
Editor: Editor: Aili Vahtla
Source: BNS