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President to handpick Latvia's next PM

Xinhua, December 31, 2015 Adjust font size:

Latvian President Raimonds Vejonis has decided to exercise his constitutional powers and personally choose a candidate for Latvia's next prime minister.

After an informal meeting with representatives of the current center-right tripartite coalition on Wednesday, Vejonis told reporters that he had decided to postpone his winter holidays and begin talking to potential prime ministerial candidates as early as next week.

"I gave the parties the opportunity to agree on the makeup of a new, capable coalition, but they did not seize this opportunity," the president said.

President Vejonis also stands by the position that the new government has to be formed by the existing coalition partners and urged them to show responsibility and political courage.

After Wednesday's meeting with the president, the centrist Greens and Farmers Union (ZZS) said they would not propose their candidate, and the center-right Unity party, which as the leader of the coalition was expected to put forward a premiership candidate, said they had only agreed with the president on a schedule for forming the government.

The right-wing National Alliance said Unity has to choose a new candidate for prime minister because both ZZS and the National Alliance, as well as several Unity members, have rejected Unity leader Solvita Aboltina's candidacy.

A new coalition government has to be formed in Latvia after Prime Minister Laimdota Straujuma announced her resignation on Dec. 7.

Unity leader Aboltina was initially seen as the most likely candidate to head the next government, but the right-wing National Alliance's refusal to accept her candidacy as well as insufficient support in her own party seem to have dashed her premiership hopes. Endit