Estonia: Reform, Centre Party to topple Tallinn government

The Estonian Reform Party and the Estonian Centre Party (Keskerakond) will topple Tallinn’s current city government next week, incumbent mayor Jevgeni Ossinovski of the Social Democratic Party (SDE) said, ERR reports. He accused Reform’s mayoral candidate, businessman Urmas Sõõrumaa, of holding token talks with other parties to obscure the party’s plan to form a new coalition with the Centre Party, which he said would be “toxic” to voters of both parties. The new coalition would operate under a “Michal-Kõlvart Pact” with “secret protocols” and be “at the mercy” of the Centre Party, Ossinovski stated, referring to Reform chairman, Prime Minister Kristen Michal, and Centre Party leader, former mayor Mihhail Kõlvart. He suggested that Kõlvart would be the “real leader” of the two-party coalition, similar to the Medvedev-Putin tandem in Russia in 2008-2012. Under the pact, Kõlvart would become mayor after the local elections in October 2025, while Sõõrumaa would return to business, Ossinovski alleged. SDE chairman Lauri Läänemets said that the central issue of the elections in Tallinn would be whether the capital city’s next mayor will be Ossinovski or Kõlvart, ERR reported.