I've spoken with the ones that quit, and they say that the clear root cause of their departure is Jaak Valge. That, taking advantage of the circumstances, Jaak Valge had positioned himself as the gray eminence of the newly established party, leading the entire party – and they didn't like that. Was this the case?

I think a good journalist, such as yourself, should of course approach such claims with a healthy dose of source criticism.

I have indeed been involved in the leadership of the party, as vice-chair. When I'm vice-chair, how can I do anything else? But have I overstepped the limits of my power somehow? That might be a good question for the [party] chair, because if I say this isn't the case, someone like Henn [Põlluaas] might say, "Oh yes it was." And then you end up in this sort of ping-pong situation.

One thing that's being bounced back and forth is the claim that you didn't allow Henn Põlluaas to run for party chair. Why didn't he qualify, then?

If you read our [party] statutes – once again, a good journalist is critical of their sources – you can check the statutes to see whether it's stated in the statutes that Valge will decide who is allowed to run for party chair, or whether that isn't stated in the statutes.

I once asked [Conservative People's Party of Estonia (EKRE) chair] Martin Helme that too – where in the statutes does it state that only Helmes can run for party chair. I don't think our statutes state that either, that Valge will decide whether Põlluaas can or not. That's for Põlluaas himself to decide.

Well, we know that, of course – no Estonian party's statutes include a clause stating that such-and-such person may run, so-and-so may not. But there are plenty of examples where someone has unexpectedly run on their own initiative, and it has ended badly for them.

I don't know of any examples of this. Look, Põlluaas is such an influential person that if he decides to run, who could possibly stop him?

If some kind of nomenclature had developed within the party, it may have been possible. Or in some more authoritarian party. But we don't have that in our statutes, and I don't have that kind of power.

So in other words, you and Henn Põlluaas, and the others who have announced their resignation from the party, are the best of friends – am I understanding you correctly?

I haven't said we're the best of friends, and there's no need to interpret my words that way. But I don't think I should be enemies with them either.

I believe these people, as they state in their announcement, still have a national-conservative worldview, and if they pursue this worldview somewhere, in some other institution or as lone fighters, like hussars, then that still benefits the worldview.

Of course I sit together with them there, and I speak with them, and I'll continue to do so. But that doesn't mean we're the best of friends. Most of my friends are outside of politics.

What do you think caused these disagreements? Something must have triggered this.

It may be that I say one thing now and Henn says another – and then we're in this sort of ping-pong match again, where maybe the only winner is our free media.

But a win for the free media is very important.

It is, yes, but Põlluaas and Valge don't win with this, when it comes to these ideological disagreements... They aren't that important. They aren't some kind of dogma, like something written in the Bible.

We had our platform open at the last board meeting, when some people – including [the four members that recently quit] – found that certain items in the platform didn't quite suit them. So we specifically decided, with a board decision, to reopen the platform. To my knowledge, not a single proposal was submitted.

What I can assume is that there may be disagreements over the fact that our current platform – which I didn't author, and I wasn't even chair of the platform committee – our platform tends to lean more toward the center on the socio-economic scale. It's a bit moderate.

Our platform also includes, for example, the need for a progressive income tax. Some people didn't like that, although it's simply included in the platform [as something] we're considering.

Maybe also that we have the ideology of national integrity, which some may not like either. They thought we should take a sharper approach in interacting with other parties.

And then maybe also the conservative nature conservation – to my knowledge, Henn didn't like our stance on phosphorite. This isn't the same as the green transition; it's protecting the nature of our homeland.

These items may not have been the most suitable. I don't know about the others, but I've discussed them with Henn, and these didn't suit Henn the best. But as it's been mentioned, our [party] congress approves the platform, and it's possible to make changes to it, based on how the party votes. The platform can be adjusted.

Did these disagreements only arise in the last few weeks, or has it always been the case, right from the very beginning, that there has been debate about what kind of new party this should be?

This discussion has been ongoing all along, as it should be. Our party is just four months old. It's completely logical that such disagreements take place during this period.

What else can I say? Maybe some of these disputes have gotten a bit sharper recently. Not exactly in the last few weeks – moreso in the last couple of months, when we had to petition the chancellor of justice regarding the phosphorite issue.

But still, all of this background – a smart journalist will look at the Norstat ratings and also notice our complaints about not having any money. A smart journalist will understand that the underlying cause of this discontent is that we haven't had an ultrafast meteoric rise. People wanted a quicker success story.

Absolutely no one predicted an ultrafast meteoric rise for you. You didn't believe in it either, did you?

Yes, but I haven't left the party. That's something you'll have to ask those other folks about. The background to this is still that, in their opinion, we should have had a higher rating. Then tensions rise, and people look for someone to blame. I believe this happens in every group. A smart journalist knows this very well.

Why are they saying that Jaak Valge is behind all this? They're very reserved about the party chair [Silver Kuusik], saying he's a great leader.

I couldn't tell you that either. Once tensions increased, I submitted my resignation as vice-chair of the party. As a gesture of goodwill, to show that I've stepped back from [the party] leadership.

This didn't seem to suffice for these people, and given this background, I believe – I can't prove it, but a smart journalist will figure out out in maybe a couple of weeks or months – that at least some of them have simply made deals with another party, and it's not hard for me to guess who.

Meaning Henn Põlluaas is joining Isamaa?

I don't know; I'm neither confirming nor denying that. I wasn't involved in those deals.

But you've heard of this?

I have.

What about the others? Who's leaving?

I don't know. I'll say it again – I'm happy, and I have no doubt that they'll continue to pursue their national conservative views. Perhaps Peeter Ernits less so – I'm not sure how strongly he holds those views – but the others will remain national conservatives, regardless of where they pursue their political aspirations.

Personally, I've probably told all of my circles of acquaintances about six months ago already that I'm gradually repositioning myself back as a historian.

I definitely won't be running in the next Riigikogu elections; I personally have no such political ambitions. Meaning, I don't have political career ambitions that would have made it necessary to sideline Henn Põlluaas or Peeter Ernits, for example. I've had no such rivalry with them whatsoever, because they aren't my rivals as historians.

So the truth is, they saw that the party wasn't gaining traction, nothing could be done, no money, few people, and very stiff competition in EKRE and Isamaa. Maybe they just made a pragmatic choice, deciding it wasn't worth the trouble?

That's not my conclusion, but I wouldn't want to dismiss your conclusion in any way either. It seems to fit the overall logic.

Claims were made that the emerging party, which always has less money at the start, later started paying people retroactively for writing the statutes, for example, and that these finances weren't quite in order either. Were they or not?

First of all, we haven't paid anyone a cent for writing the statutes. We've had little money as it is, and we simply wouldn't have been able to afford to do that. Claims that we started retroactively paying money for writing the statutes simply aren't true.

--

Follow ERR News on Facebook and Twitter and never miss an update!