Municipal Elections in Lithuania

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Twenty-six out of Lithuania’s 60 municipalities elected their mayors in the first round of elections on March 5, meaning they had secured at least 50 percent of the votes.

Vilija BLINKEVICIUTE

Vilija Blinkevičiūtė, leader of the Lithuanian Social Democratic Party (LSDP), said that her party won Sunday’s local elections. At a press conference she noted  “…we have as many as ten mayors elected in the first round, twice as many as in the previous elections in 2019, “ adding that “we also have the largest number of members on municipal councils: 357 seats across all 60 municipalities, which is 100 seats more than in the previous elections.” The LSDP won 274 seats, including those of mayors, four years ago. The LSDP leader played down the failure of Social Democratic mayoral candidates in Vilnius and Klaipėda to make it to the run-off round. Blinkevičiūtė said the Social Democrats’ victory in the local elections is important for next year’s parliamentary elections. Figures from the Central Electoral Commission show that on March 5 the LSDP won 17.5 percent of the vote nationwide. Fourteen Social Democrats who did not secure the required 50 percent of votes are heading to the run-off round.

The runner-up with 16.2 percent of the votes was the ruling conservative Homeland Union-Lithuanian Christian Democrats (TS-LKD), who felt that the results were good. “We are particularly satisfied with the results in the big cities, i.e., Vilnius and Klaipėda where we’ll still have runoffs,” said Radvilė Morkūnaitė-Mikulėnienė, the head of the party’s political group in the Seimas. This year, 65,700 voters in Vilnius voted for the TS-LKD, compared to 34,000 voters four years ago. The 16-percent result is unchanged from 2019 when the conservatives secured 274 seats, including mayors.

A leader of the Lithuanian Liberal Movement said that the party is pleased with its performance in Sunday’s local elections and expects to have mayors in ten municipalities. “We were pleased with the results […]. The Liberal Movement’s numbers are growing. We are at number one or two in as many as 12 municipalities,” Edita Rudelienė, the first deputy chairperson of the party, told reporters. The Liberal Movement expects to have ten mayors after the March 19 run-off round, improving the 2019 result. “Today we see that people are returning to traditional parties and that trust in them is growing,” she said. The Liberals failed to reach the minimum needed to be allocated seats on the city councils of Vilnius and Kaunas, but won three seats in Klaipėda. The Liberal Movement received 7 percent of the vote nationwide, up from 5.9 percent in the previous elections in 2019. Four Liberal candidates won the mayoral races – in Plungė, Joniškis, Rietavas and Tauragė – in the first round and six others made it to the run-off round.

MEP Waldemar Tomaszewski, leader of the Electoral Action of Poles in Lithuania-Christian Families Alliance (LLRA-KŠS), said he had no doubt the party’s candidate, Waldemar Urban, will be elected mayor of Vilnius District. Urban received 46.63 percent of the vote in the first round, well ahead of his closest challenger, Social Democrat Robert Duchnevič, with 24.84 percent. Tomaszewski said that the results of Sunday’s first round were good for the party, with more votes than in 2019. “We had 59,000 votes and 5 percent in the previous elections, and 5.5 percent and about 65,000 votes in these elections. This is a significant improvement,” he said. Tomaszewski noted that the LLRA-KŠS won 55 seats in Vilnius District overall. “In Vilnius, we not only maintained our position, but we also strengthened it. Seven seats are of considerable weight,” he said.

Zdzisław Palewicz of the Electoral Action of Poles in Lithuania-Christian Families Alliance emerged as the top-scorer in Sunday’s elections, winning 80 percent of the vote to be re-elected mayor of Šalčininkai District, the post he has held since 2009.

Visvaldas Matijošaitis, leader of the United Kaunas political committee, retains his position as mayor of Lithuania’s second-biggest city with 59 percent of the vote.