Lithuanian municipal election candidates finalized

2015 01 29. [Newer info on results of elections available here] Final candidate lists have been approved for 2015 03 01 municipal elections when Lithuanians will elect municipal councils and mayors.

People will vote for one of the suggested candidate lists (mostly partisan) and mark numbers of the politicians within that list they prefer. The lists that will receive the most votes will win seats and these seats will be taken by politicians from those lists that were marked by most voters.

On a separate ballot, people will also vote for mayors.

Lithuanian citizens living abroad may not participate in the municipal elections but (as per European Union requirements) foreign citizens living in Lithuania may participate.

Major parties

Three political parties listed candidates in all 60 municipalities are: Homeland Union (centrist conservative), Socialdemocrats (leftist), Liberal Movement (laissez-faire).

Other main parties that listed candidates in 30-59 municipalities are: Labour (personal), Order and Justice (personal), Freedom Union - Liberals (limited laissez-faire) and Peasants/Greens (localist / agriculturalist).

The three main cities are dominated by centrist/rightist thought, therefore battles between the Homeland Union and both Liberal factions are likely. In most smaller municipalities leftist and personal parties are likely to prevail. Peasants/Greens are especially strong in rural locations.

Minor parties and Electoral committes

In addition to these parties 16 smaller parties listed their candidates in 1-15 municipalities each. Most of them contest main cities where there are more citizens and more diverse political life. With a 4% threshold applicable everywhere however being elected will not be an easy deal.

Minority rights (Polish and Russian) parties may be luckier in the regions with strong ethnic minorities (Eastern Lithuania and Klaipėda city). Lithuanian Poles' Electoral Action is the strongest minority party, dominating several municipalities for decades. A few non-ethnic parties also have their strongholds, such as Center Party in Varėna.

In General, the number of minor party lists has decreased. Some parties no longer even contest the municipalities they have won seats at the previous elections (2011).

One of the reasons may be that the first time in Lithuanian municipal elections non-partisan Electoral committees have been allowed to participate alongside parties. Some politicians, including a few well-known figures, have drifted to such committees, draining the parties. Electoral committees are established to propose candidates in a single election in a single municipality. Most municipality ballots will offer at least a single Electoral committee list.

The Electoral committees and minor parties will be disadvantaged, however. They are ineligible to taxpayer-paid air time on radio and TV (which will be available to the major parties that have their candidates in 30+ municipalities). The ability to privately fund political advertisement is restricted in Lithuania and many electoral committees / minor parties would not have the resources needed anyway, meaning it will be hard for them to convey their proposals to the people.

That said, several Electoral committees have been endorsed by famous businessmen and their posters are already available in the respective cities in comparable numbers to those of major parties.

Mayoral elections

These elections will be the first when mayors will be directly elected. A separate ballot will be used for that and in case no single candidate in that municipality would receive 50%+ votes then runoffs would be held at 2015 03 15.

Mayoral seats in the major cities are especially contested, with Vilnius mayor seat the most prized possession. So-much-so that out of 6 defeated candidates in 2014 presidential elections 3 have returned this year to seek to become Vilnius mayor (total number of candidates: 12).

In some minor municipalities mayoral elections garnered much less attention. For example, there are merely 3 candidates willing to be mayor of Rietavas.

Lithuanian politics specialists are intrigued not only by the voting results at mayoral elections but also by post-elections situation. While there have been suggestions to alter mayoral powers, for now, they have remained largely unchanged and modelled on the previous electoral system where the mayor was elected by municipality council and thereby always shared political beliefs with the ruling majority. This raises a question how will the situation unfold if the voters would elect mayor and council majority from different political powers.

However, nearly all Lithuanian municipalities are ruled by coalitions anyways, so a cooperation between different political groupings is a daily business.

List of participating parties

This list of participating parties includes the number of municipalities they contest ("Lists"), the number of municipalities they contested in previous elections ("Lists (2011)") and the number of seats they won back then ("2011 Seats").

The leftist/rightist policy and western/eastern/local valuea divisions and are explained in the article "Political ideas", while conventional/personal/minority party type division is explained in the article "Politics in Lithuania".

Newly participating parties that field 3 or more lists will be the Greens (7 lists, leftist western), Way of Courage (5 lists, protest party), Lithuanian List (3 lists, protest party), Tautininkai (3 lists, leftist local).

Several parties that won seats have not returned at this election. The New Union and Christian party have integrated into the Labor party, A. Zuokas coalition has integrated into the Freedom Union whereas the far left pro-Eastern Socialist People's Front decided not to partake in these elections.

Full lists of candidates are available at the official website of State Electoral Office.