Parties' European election candidate lists to be finalized by mid-April
Estonia's political parties will have finalized their candidate lists for June's European Parliament elections by mid-April, if not earlier.
A maximum of nine candidates can be listed, in order, for the June 9 election, where Estonia is treated as a single electoral district, and seven MEP mandates are up for grabs.
The parties' state of play on this, in alphabetical order, is as follows:
The Center Party's board will confirm its election list at the end of this month. Center has one MEP at present, Jana Toom.
The Conservative People's Party of Estonia (EKRE) says it is to confirm its election list at a board meeting taking place this Saturday. EKRE's sole current MEP is Jaak Madison.
Evelyn Sepp, leader of the Estonian Green Party (Rohelised), told ERR the party will confirm its list at the end of the month. The Greens have no current sitting MEP.
Isamaa chair Urmas Reinsalu said the party's board is to convene on March 24 to confirm its election list. Isamaa has one sitting MEP, Riho Terras.
Parempoolsed spokesperson Kristjan Jõevere told ERR that the party will unveil its list for the European Parliament elections at a party board meeting on April 13. Founded in 2022, the party is contesting its first European election.
The Reform Party is to confirm its election list at a party congress on April 7. Reform has two sitting MEPs, Andrus Ansip and Urmas Paet.
The Social Democratic Party (SDE) already confirmed its list of candidates at the party congress last Saturday. SDE also has two MEPs at present, Marina Kaljurand and Sven Mikser, both of whom are running again.
ERR had not spoken to a representative of Eesti 200 at the time of writing.
European election candidate registration begins on April 10 and ends at 6 p.m. on April 20. The European Parliament elections take place June 6-9, with Sunday, June 9 being polling day in Estonia, preceded by several days' advance voting, when e-votes may be cast.
Estonia uses the d'Hondt system of proportional representation, meaning parties run ordered lists with what they view as the candidates who will attract the most votes placed higher up on the list.
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Editor: Andrew Whyte, Aleksander Krjukov
