It appears that the process of finding a new president has now concluded. Ülle Madise, the Chancellor of Justice, has been submitted to the Riigikogu as the sole candidate with 75 supporting signatures, and it is very likely that the Riigikogu will confirm her as the new president.

There are probably no surprises left, but in politics one can never be certain until things are officially decided. So we will wait for next week and then see. Until then, we can look back at the process a bit and assess what actually happened. Some steps and decisions were logical, but some inevitably remain at least somewhat unclear.

The very first move in this process was made by EKRE already in early May, stating directly and explicitly that their presidential candidate is Mart Helme. With this, they essentially signaled that they would not participate in the process of finding a president in the Riigikogu, since it was highly unlikely that any other party would support Mart Helme's candidacy.

EKRE itself does not have enough seats in the Riigikogu to nominate its own candidate. That privilege currently belongs only to the Reform Party, which approached the entire process very calmly and did not rush. And other parties did not hurry much either. Summer passed quietly. Against this backdrop, several "candidate‑candidates" were active — people who essentially put themselves forward without any party directly backing them.

Riho Ühtegi, one of these candidate‑candidates and perhaps the main figure who could have clearly appealed to more conservative politicians and voters, withdrew in early August due to health reasons. A few days later, university rectors proposed Tallinn University of Technology rector Tiit Land as a candidate‑candidate. In fact, Tiit Land had already been mentioned as a candidate‑candidate in mid‑July by Reform Party founding member Neinar Seli.

Parallel to this, Ülle Madise — who had for some time been considered a possible candidate‑candidate — indicated that if she received sufficient support, she would be willing to run for president. The governing parties and the Social Democrats began aligning behind her.

Ülle Madise announced her willingness to run for president on 17 August. The day after, a poll commissioned by Delfi and conducted by Turu‑uuringute AS in early August was published, showing that 32 percent of voters — among those who had a preference — supported her as president. Support for other candidate‑candidates was significantly lower.

The support of the governing parties and the Social Democrats for Madise was strong, but not enough to elect a president in the Riigikogu. And although there were other candidate‑candidates, in the end the attention focused on Tiit Land alongside Madise.

This likely benefited Madise's chances of being elected, because a candidate who defines themselves as a liberal and strongly supports the green transition is not someone who would genuinely appeal to more conservative MPs — for example, from Isamaa or the Center Party. If the alternative to Ülle Madise is Tiit Land, then for some MPs Madise may seem a much more suitable candidate than she otherwise would. The situation would likely have been very different if the alternative had been Riho Ühtegi.

Thus, it is logical why Isamaa ultimately decided to support Madise. It remains at least partly unclear why the Center Party was and remained behind Tiit Land.

Both the Center Party and EKRE have, in a sense, stayed outside this process in the Riigikogu. Both parties have long supported the idea that the president should not be chosen through the Riigikogu, but by the Estonian electorate. Direct elections have also always been the preference of a very large share of Estonian citizens. According to the latest Norstat and Institute of Societal Studies poll (19–20 August), 70 percent of voters support direct elections.

In addition to wanting to elect the president directly, citizens are also dissatisfied with the current process. According to the Institute of Societal Studies, 59 percent of voters are unhappy with the presidential election process. And no wonder. The dynamics of finding a president — why someone ran or did not run, or who supported whom and why — inevitably remain opaque to the public.

When decisions are made in party backrooms and the president is essentially chosen before the Riigikogu even votes, this dissatisfaction is not surprising.

At the same time, this process paradoxically produces a result that currently aligns very well with voter preferences.

As of 20 August, more Estonian citizens supported electing Ülle Madise as president (43 percent) than opposed it (36 percent). And it was clear that parties acted in line with their voters' preferences. Madise's election was supported by 83 percent of Reform Party voters, 69 percent of Social Democratic voters, and 57 percent of Isamaa voters. Fifty percent of Center Party voters and 79 percent of EKRE voters did not support her election.

It seems that the Estonian electorate, on average, is now getting the president they most know how to want. If direct presidential elections were held with the same candidates who remained in the final selection now, the result would likely also be that Ülle Madise becomes president.

If Estonia truly had direct presidential elections, this would mean that the nomination process would not be controlled by parties. In that case, the pool of candidates — and therefore the final result — would likely be different.

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