Ansip, a former Reform Party chair, made his remarks following the exit of Reform from Tallinn city government earlier this week.

"Setting coalitions in place from some headquarters, that doesn't work," Ansip told Delfi.

Interpersonal relationships can matter more than party affiliation when it comes to local government, he noted. "At the local level, this is all potholes in the tarmac, pipes and brooms, rakes and shovels. Everyday organizational issues are less ideological than they are at the national government level," Ansip said.

He also stated that he was opposed to Reform ruling out cooperating with any given political party, as it has done with regard to the Center Party.

Ansip said he found the recent Tallinn coalition split, ostensibly on the issue of kindergarten fees, "embarrassing," though primarily laid the blame at the door of Mayor Jevgeni Ossinovski (SDE) rather than his own party.

That said, Ansip found Michal's apology to Reform voters made Thursday to be the right thing to have done, also calling it a positive thing that Michal, as party leader, did not leave high and dry in the power struggle former Tallinn deputy mayor Pärtel-Peeter Pere.

In Ansip's view, matters within Tallinn's ruling coalition should have been settled without scandals like this one and by making concrete agreements. "So that it would be clear to all parties what was agreed upon," he concluded.

Pere resigned on Monday, one day before Reform as a whole left the coalition, leaving an SDE-Eesti 200-Isamaa minority coalition to govern the capital. The local elections take place in October.

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