“YEA, VERILY I say unto you that acting Interior Minister Ivars Godmanis is the man to lead us from bondage to the promised land!”

Please forgive the slightly questionable translation from Latvian, but that was basically the gist of what President Dr Zatlers said Dec. 14 when he nominated Godmanis - who looks like a bad-tempered Father Christmas - to form a new government.

Is Godmanis the right man for the job? Baltic Bulletin said weeks ago that he was clearly the best of a bad bunch and that still holds true. There have been a few interesting diversions along the way, including:

• Edgars Zalans running what must rank as the most inept election campaign in Latvian political history. Within hours of announcing his candidacy it was confirmed that he had been brainwashed (and was proud of the fact), didn’t read newspapers because they gave him bad vibes and would refuse to appear on the only decent show on Latvian TV. Nulle points to Kuldiga’s answer to Harry Potter. Stick to quidditch in future.
• The emergence of ladies’ favourite and Krajbanka boss Martins Bondars as one to watch for the future. The blue-eyed Adonis is more than a pretty face though, and looks like he is gradually moving towards mainstream political involvement.
• The Pabriks/Stokenbergs camp keeping their powder dry and uttering nary a word about the whole thing. Which just proves again how shrewd they are. ‘Cometh the hour’ and all that…

So what now? Well, the People’s Party owes Godmanis for his staunch support during their disastrous attempt to hound Aleksejs Loskutovs from office. Let’s not forget that it was ‘Attack Dog’ Godmanis who was sent onto TV to keep Pabriks on side during the infamous Kas Notiek Latvia? appearance. He won’t like being reminded about that, but he’s big enough and smart enough to deflect the blows.

The real question is whether God can work in mysterious ways to get Nearly-New Era on board. Without them, Godmanis will be presiding over the same old cronies and won’t fancy his chances. With them, he can justify his administration as something fresh… ish. Notably, his recent comments regarding the need to clamp down on public spending sound very close to New Era’s own pronouncements.

And let’s not forget that Godmanis’ own ‘party’, the Siamese twin-like LPP/LNNK didn’t even back him. What sort of payback will Ainars Slesers, the Yin to Godmanis’ Yan, demand for support? Probably the sole leadership of the party, a matter which remains undecided.

In God we trust? Hmm, it’ll take more than faith to form a government right now.

This entry was posted on Friday, December 14th, 2007 at 7:18 pm and is filed under Miscellaneous, Latvia. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.