SDE, Isamaa and EKRE submit Tallinn local election candidate lists
The Social Democrats (SDE), Isamaa and the Conservative People's Party of Estonia (EKRE) have all submitted their full candidate lists for Tallinn ahead of next month's local elections.
The three parties submitted their candidate names to the election commission on Monday, one day before the deadline to do so.
Long dominated by the Center Party, Tallinn has become more of a battleground going into October's local elections, with Center being ejected from office in April 2024 and the replacement government being a minority coalition since the Reform Party left office in the capital in July.
Current mayor, Jevgeni Ossinovski, is from SDE, the party is running nearly 170 candidates in Tallinn.
As with other parties, SDE have strategically chosen who to run and where: Their longest list is in the Põhja-Tallinn district with 29 candidates headed by Natalie Mets.
In the Pirita district, the SDE list is half that length.
Isamaa, in office with SDE and Eesti 200 since April 2024, is meanwhile running 180 candidates in Tallinn, with the last of these only signing up in recent days.
Opposition party EKRE is running 88 candidates, almost all of them party members.
Party leader and mayor candidate Martin Helme told "Aktuaalne kaamera" the list in Tallinn was something of a family affair.
"We have eight districts; in three districts there is a Helme [running]," he said, adding that these were him, his stepmother and his spouse.
"I am in Kesklinn, Monika Helme in Haabersti, Eva Helme is in Lasnamäe," he went on.
Ossinovski, seeking re-election as mayor, is running for SDE in the Kesklinn (city center) district. SDE's biggest competitor is the Center Party and the campaign will focus on the capital's issues, Ossinovski noted.
"This is also a battle of visions without doubt," he said, adding that it would be hard if not impossible for SDE to be in a coalition with either Center or EKRE.
"One can rest assured that the Social Democrats will not be cooperating with EKRE in Tallinn. It is also clear that the Social Democrats will not give their vote to a city government led by [Center Party leader and former mayor Mihhail] Kõlvart," he added.
Isamaa's Tallinn mayor candidate is party leader Urmas Reinsalu.
"People have also said in recent days that they never thought they would go into politics. Let alone run in local elections," he noted of the party's finalized candidate list.
Center is the main competitor for Isamaa too, in Tallinn, he added.
"I believe that the biggest competitor is the Center Party and so it is very important that we do not end up with fragmented city governance," Reinsalu, who is running in Nõmme district, added.
The largest number of Isamaa candidates by district is in Kesklinn, headed by former government minister Riina Solman.
Meanwhile Helme would not rule in or out potential future coalition partners, on the grounds that this would be making the decision for voters ahead of the fact, and would also serve to weaken EKRE's negotiating position in any coalition talks.
Polling day is October 19, preceded by a week's advance voting period.
The number of eligible voters in Tallinn has fallen from nearly 353,000 to a little over 323,000 following a constitutional amendment in late March which strips the right to vote from third country (non-EU) nationals resident in Tallinn. Previously, this demographic had been able to vote in local, but not national elections.
There are eight electoral districts in Tallinn: In addition to Kesklinn, Pirita, Põhja-Tallinn and Nõmme, these are Lasnamäe, Mustamäe, Haabersti and Kristiine.
No other city in Estonia is subdivided into districts for local government purposes, and there are 14 other town municipalities and 64 rural municipalities.
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Editor: Andrew Whyte, Valner Väino
Source: 'Aktuaalne kaamera,' reporter Anne Raiste.
