Toivo Tootsen, member of the Center Party since 1992
When you’re old enough like me, sometimes it’s good to look back – to see how things have been. And some past situations seem to be very similar to the current ones. Not that history repeats itself, but a parallel seems to emerge.
The 2003 Riigikogu elections were exceptionally successful for the Center Party – we got 28 mandates! Before the elections, we were in a coalition with the Reform Party, the head of government was Siim Kallas. It seemed logical that we would continue. But just before the formation of the new coalition, there was a bang – the deputy mayor of Tallinn, Vladimir Panov, from the center party, was handcuffed in front of the TV cameras. The media screamed, the prosecutor’s office triumphed: a huge labor victory, we caught the corrupt person! I will add here right away: after a five-year trial, Panov was found to be completely right and the accusations were found to be unfounded. But who knew that! The Reform Party now refused to form a coalition with the Center Party as a corrupt party, and joined forces with Res Publica and the People’s Union of Estonia. Parts became the prime minister.
Kaunis nukker was the meeting of the first new composition of the Central Faction on March 6, 2003. Edgar gave an overview of the state of affairs. That we got the most votes in the elections, we had won the elections, but at the same time it was clear that we would not get into the government. Certainly, several former ministers were disappointed that Edgar did not manage to turn our good election performance into a victory. The fire smoldered under the ashes, but flared up in late summer, prompted by the accession to the European Union. The Center Party did not take a clear position that it supports the merger, but left the decision to the conscience of the members.
This gave the internal opposition a reason to act faster than before. They tried to get the regions under their control, it was demanded that the Kesknädal newspaper had the majority of their representatives in its editorial office, and the opposition began to publicly accuse Savisaart of dictatorship. They declared that to demand the same submission of all party members to the decisions of the party leadership is to enslave party members. You said that demanding submission to all party decisions is a formal-bureaucratic attitude. A group of social liberals had emerged in the party.
The biggest clash was on March 24, 2004, when the leadership of the faction was elected. Vilja Savisaar was elected as chairman, Ain Seppik and Mihhail Stalnuhhin as vice-chairmen. This is what the majority of the faction wanted. It was a good blow to the social liberals, so they decided to leave the group. Quite boisterously, of course. All this ended with Peeter Kreitzberg, Harri Õunapuu, Sven Mikser, Jaanus Marrandi, Robert Lepikson, Liina Tõnisson, Olev Laanjärv and Mark Soosaar sitting under the window in the Riigikogu. In the row of benches on the window side, members of the Riigikogu who do not belong to factions sit in the Riigikogu, and probably never before have as many as eight members sat there at the same time. They could not form their own faction, but the Social Liberals created the Riigikogu association. Before the 2005 local elections, they founded their non-profit organization Estonian Social Liberals, but they were not successful in the elections.
However, the places of those who left were not empty: for example, Enn Eesmaa joined the party, Kadri Must became the new general secretary, Vilja Savisaar became the chairman of the faction, Jüri Ratas, Mailis Reps, Lauri Laasi, Marika Tuus, Heimar Lenk and other later good players began to emerge. And the party soon got back into government: in 2005, the Reform Party expelled Res Publica from the government and replaced it with the Center Party. Those who left the party, however, lost everything. Later, only Sven Mikser managed to stay afloat in politics.
Such a thing came to mind when I looked at the three former party members now sitting under the window in the Riigikogu.
