As president, Arnold Rüütel played an important role in Estonia's accession to the European Union. Rüütel publicly supported Estonia joining the EU and urged people to vote in favor of accession in the September 14, 2003, referendum. His support was particularly important in rural areas and among people who were initially skeptical of the EU. As a result, he also received recognition from political opponents in parties that had not supported him in the 2001 presidential election. That did not mean, however, that they supported Rüütel's reelection in 2006.

Rüütel himself understood the political situation and that he had no chance of being elected by the Riigikogu. He therefore decided not to stand as a candidate in the Riigikogu rounds of the 2006 presidential election. Nor did he take part in an ETV televised debate featuring Ene Ergma and Toomas Hendrik Ilves, the candidates nominated in the Riigikogu.

Members of the People's Union and Center Party, which backed Rüütel, did not collect their ballots. There has also been speculation that the decision not to vote was actually driven by fears that, in a secret ballot, some People's Union and Center Party members might vote for Toomas Hendrik Ilves and thereby hand him victory. As later became clear, just three or four additional votes would have been enough.

Members of Isamaa, Res Publica, the Reform Party and the Social Democratic Party took part in the voting.

There was only one candidate in each of the Riigikogu rounds of the presidential election on August 28 and 29: Ene Ergma in the first round and Toomas Hendrik Ilves in the second and third rounds. Ergma received 65 votes in the first round, while Ilves received 64 votes in both the second and third rounds. At least 68 votes were required.

The election once again went to the Electoral College.

On September 13, 2006, 80 prominent cultural figures publicly declared their support for Toomas Hendrik Ilves. The signatories included Jaan Kross, Viivi Luik, Arvo Pärt, Neeme Järvi, Ain Kaalep, Jaan Kaplinski, Olev Subbi, Enn Põldroos, Jüri Arrak, Erast Parmasto, Ita Ever, Kaljo Kiisk, Aarne Üksküla, Merle Karusoo, Mart Saarma, Fred Jüssi, Kuno Areng, Tõnis Mägi, Ellen Niit, Enn Soosaar, Doris Kareva, Jaak Jõerüüt and Riho Sibul, among others. The aim was to persuade undecided electors to support Ilves.

On September 23, the day the Electoral College convened for the presidential election, musicians supporting presidential candidate Toomas Hendrik Ilves gathered outside the Estonia Theater in Tallinn to perform a concert in his support and, in their words, appeal to the electors' consciences. The support concert was led by Jaan Elgula, while Hannes Rumm, then deputy chair of the Social Democratic Party group on Tallinn City Council, handled the organizational side. Performers included Tõnis Mägi, Ivo Linna, Riho Sibul and Mihkel Raud, among others. People who came to watch the concert and demonstration remained outside the Estonia Theater until the election result was announced.

A total of 345 electors took part in the Electoral College vote on September 23, 2006. Ilves received 174 votes and Rüütel 162. Eight electors submitted blank ballots and one ballot was invalid. Ilves narrowly but decisively won the presidency.

After his victory, Toomas Hendrik Ilves and his wife Evelin went out onto the Estonia Theater balcony to wave to the people waiting outside the opera house.

'Everyone felt the president was being elected'

Toivo Tootsen, who was a member of the Center Party's Riigikogu group at the time, recalled that the contest between Rüütel and Ilves had become highly charged.

"It was the other side in particular that made it so heated. The two sides were evenly matched. Rüütel had very strong supporters, while it seemed to me that the younger generation was very firmly behind Ilves. It was one of the presidential elections that drew the biggest crowds. On election day, there were very, very many people outside the Estonia Theater cheering on both sides," Tootsen recalled.

"It was a real presidential election where everyone truly felt that a president was being elected," he added.

According to Tootsen, Ilves' victory was helped by an anti-Rüütel campaign that grew increasingly fierce. "Somehow, the momentum had faded. And even before the election, the campaign against Rüütel had become quite nasty. All of that left its mark," he said.

Tootsen said Rüütel's team realized immediately that there was no point in running in the Riigikogu and that his best chance of victory lay with the Electoral College. "There was no guarantee of anything there either, but the calculation was simply that there was a better chance of winning in the Electoral College," Tootsen said.

Although Rüütel was primarily the People's Union's candidate, Tootsen said the Center Party was also firmly behind him. "If we had promised our support, then we gave it," Tootsen said.

'Ilves' campaign much more vocal'

Jaanus Männik, who headed the People's Union's Riigikogu group at the time, said the election was indeed highly emotional.

"We were accused of something that, under the Constitution, we could not be accused of. It was precisely our opponents from the other parties who did that. Their attitude toward a highly popular president running for reelection was, to put it mildly, strange and they essentially began putting pressure on him not to run," Männik said.

According to Männik, Rüütel was the president with the greatest public support and was able to unite the country. That claim, however, is not entirely accurate. Arnold Rüütel's approval rating as president had indeed remained high throughout his term, but began to decline in the summer of 2006 as alternative candidates emerged. When respondents were asked to choose between Rüütel and another candidate, support was fairly evenly divided when he was matched against presidential candidate Ene Ergma, but support for Toomas Hendrik Ilves was significantly stronger. Just over a third of respondents (34-37 percent) supported Rüütel, while half supported Ilves.

"His opponents treated him with quite openly expressed disdain. Everyone naturally has the right to support their own candidate and it makes sense to highlight your candidate's good qualities rather than unjustifiably smear the opposing candidate, which was done very noticeably at the time," Männik said.

Männik said Rüütel was also attacked for not running in the Riigikogu rounds. "At the time, they also tried to construct a rather curious argument that the two parties that did not take part in the Riigikogu vote were somehow not acting entirely properly in constitutional terms. But it cannot be interpreted that way. Every member of the Riigikogu has the right to decide whether or not to participate," Männik said.

"Ilves' campaign was certainly much louder, more strident and more given to superlatives than Rüütel's campaign," Männik recalled.

Männik said Ilves' campaign might have been expected to deliver him a much stronger result, but in fact it did not. "The result was very close. In the end, things turned out well, but this time Rüütel did not win; Toomas Hendrik Ilves did," Männik said.

'A former communist versus a CIA agent'

Randel Länts, a member of Toomas Hendrik Ilves' campaign team, said the campaign began with meetings with the public, after which the team recruited prominent figures who were willing to publicly support Ilves.

"That was probably one of the things that irritated the other side because they had significantly less spontaneous support from prominent figures. After that, we began mapping out the electors and communicating with them," Länts said.

Länts recalled that Ilves' victory did not come easily, but required hard, systematic work to secure the support of electors.

"It was very clear that there were some people whose preference was known and we had to keep them on board, so to speak, to make sure they would be there on the right day and would definitely vote. Then there was a whole group of people who had not yet made up their minds. They were the ones we focused most of our efforts on," Länts said.

"We had our own small campaign team that updated an Excel spreadsheet every day. We used a kind of traffic-light system. Green meant that the vote should go to Ilves, red meant it would go to Rüütel and yellow indicated the people we were working on every day. There were about two or three weeks of intensive work like that," he added.

Länts said that in the Riigikogu, the Center Party first heard from both candidates and then threw its support behind Rüütel. As a result, there were not enough votes in the Riigikogu for Ilves to reach the required 68.

According to Länts, the election was heated, but no worse than the usual political contest. "There were certainly mutual accusations about each other's backgrounds and past activities. One was called a former communist and the other a CIA agent. It was all political rhetoric aimed at appealing to their own electors and voters. There was undoubtedly some of that and it came from both sides. But I wouldn't say it was the dominant feature," Länts said.

According to Länts, the central message of Ilves' campaign was that Estonia needed to enter a new era with new leaders who were free of the burdens of the past.

Ilves took the oath of office on October 10. He was 52 when he became president for the first time.

When Ilves took office in Kadriorg in 2006, 71 percent of respondents said they trusted him, while 18 percent did not. Ilves' trust rating rose further in the years that followed. In June and July 2007, the share of respondents who trusted him rose to 75 percent. By the end of his first term, his support had declined somewhat but remained high at 65 percent.

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