Estonia's first female premier to plot course back to EU's liberal mainstream

Estonia plans to swear in a new government on Tuesday, led by the Baltic state's first female prime minister, less than a fortnight after a corruption scandal brought down a controversial ruling coalition that included the far right.

Kaja Kallas will head a 15-member government comprising appointees from her centre-right Reform party and the centre-left Centre party. The cabinet – which includes seven women – will be sworn in by Kersti Kaljulaid, who in 2016 became the first woman to serve as president of the 1.3 million-strong country.

"The first thing that we will address is the [coronavirus] health crisis," Ms Kallas (43) said on Monday after signing a coalition pact with Centre party leader Juri Ratas.

“Any crisis can become a ‘fertiliser’ for the future. The coalition agreement contains many ideas on how to make best use of the crisis for Estonia,” the country’s public broadcaster quoted her as saying.

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As an alliance of the two biggest parties in Estonia's 101-seat parliament, known as the Riigikogu, the new government will command a majority of 59 seats.

Often-fractious alliance

As well as laying out plans to help Estonia’s health service, education system and economy tackle and recover from the pandemic, the coalition deal states the government’s support for liberal values, following 20 months when the far-right Ekre party ruled in often-fractious alliance with the Centre party.

“We stand for a forward-looking political culture that treats all groups in society with respect, and for respectful government based on the spirit of our constitution . . . We stand for the rights of all people in Estonia, including minorities, and we respect privacy,” the agreement reads.

Ms Kallas's Reform party won the 2019 parliamentary election, but Mr Ratas retained power and remained premier by striking a deal with Ekre, which is dominated by father and son nationalists Mart and Martin Helme.

Mart Helme raised hackles by describing neighbouring Finland's prime minister as a "sales girl" and saying gay people should "run to Sweden" if they felt uncomfortable in Estonia. He resigned as interior minister in November after calling then US president-elect Joe Biden and his son Hunter "corrupt", during an interview in which Martin said the US elections had been "faked . . . on a massive scale".

Possible corruption

Mr Ratas stepped down this month when prosecutors said the Centre party and an adviser to Martin Helme, who was then Estonia’s finance minister, were among those being investigated for possible corruption in a major property development in the country’s capital, Tallinn. All those involved deny wrongdoing.

"Except for the machinations of the loser of the 2019 elections, [Ms Kallas] should have become prime minister already two years ago," said Toomas Hendrik Ilves, Estonia's president from 2006 - 2016.

“Estonia would have been spared two years of shame and embarrassment from the worst government since the re-establishment of independence” in 1991, he added.