Page 14 - CE Outlook Regions 2024

The Lithuanian Social Democratic Party (LSDP) will certainly continue to top the political party rankings in 2024. If the Seimas election were held in December 2023, 19.9% of respondents would vote for this party.
As of December 10, the ruling conservative Homeland Union has 7.7% of support, followed by the opposition Lithuanian Farmers and Greens Union with 7.6%, and the opposition Democrats For Lithuania with 7.5%.
In Estonia, the likelihood of having a new prime minister in 2024 is also very high, at 70-80%, due to the bad performance of the ruling Reform Party. Its chairwoman and the country’s prime minister, Kaja Kallas, has not only been losing the support of the public and the junior coalition partners, but also her own party.
After winning re-election in March (the Reform Party formed a government with the centre-right Eesti 200 Party and the Social Democrats), Kallas’ popularity swiftly tumbled after she belatedly announced she was planning tax rises to bring down the country’s budget deficit, even though the economy is still struggling to emerge from recession.
Kallas has also appeared hypocritical in her hawkish stance on sanctions against Moscow after it was revealed that her husband’s logistics company had continued to operate in Russia after the invasion. Kaja Kallas had provided a loan of €300,000 to her husband’s business.
As a result, in the November Kantar poll, 16% pledged their support to the Reform Party, while support for the opposition parties, EKRE and Isamaa, has surged lately and will likely stay above 20% throughout 2024.
Latvia’s new ruling coalition could also face a rocky year as New Unity with the left-leaning Progressives party and the Greens ) only have a mere two-seat majority in the parliament, the Saeima.
14 CE Outlook 2021 www.intellinews.com