Who is lithuania current president

Ultimately, however, this clash resulted in the retirement of the Minister of Foreign Affairs. Other Lithuanian ministers of foreign affairs did not show any inclination to confront the president, even if their positions sometimes differed. But after the Parliamentary elections in October , the new government formed by the Conservatives and Liberals initiated a public discussion that the right of representation to the European Council should be transferred to the PM.

The political battle is still underway, and it only confirms that presidential powers in Lithuania is not written in stone but rather a result of a complex of compromises between a president and a government. Elgie R. Three waves of semi-presidential studies. Democratization , 23 1 : Raunio, T. Tavits, M. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Throughout his presidency, outgoing U. The power of the head of state to suspend or commute individual sentences is and has been for centuries present in virtually all countries around the world.

The table below summarises constitutional regulations on presidential pardon power in 22 European republics. Only seven countries vest presidents with a relatively unlimited pardon power; nevertheless, presidents may still be effectively bound by established practices and legal precedents or other sub-constitutional routines employed by administrative staff handling pardon requests.

Notably, only the Czech president can grant amnesties, i. Icelandic presidents present a similar exception as they can not only pardon individuals after sentencing but also halt prosecution. Restrictions on pardon power vary greatly and present a far from uniform picture.

In particular, there is no clear covariation with regime type, mode of presidential election or scope of other presidential power. Presidents in Cyprus and Greece may only issue pardons on recommendation of other bodies, the Irish, Maltese and Portuguese president need to consult with the government, and the Finnish president requires a report from the Supreme Court. In contrast, only three countries exclude individuals from receiving pardons.

While the Polish president cannot pardon those that have been convicted by the Tribunal of State, presidents in Greece and Iceland require the consent of parliament to pardon ministers.

Finally, eight countries require a countersignature for presidential pardons either by the minister of justice or another cabinet member responsible or by the Prime Minister. Notably, in Czechia, Italy, Latvia and Slovakia that countersignature absolves the president of political responsibility which is then borne by the signing minister.

The use of pardon power in Europe has certainly garnered fewer headlines in recent years that of Donald Trump; nevertheless, there are still some interesting cases to highlight here. The move was widely decried by legal experts and opposition politicians, who subsequently launched an unsuccessful no-confidence motion in the government as the decision had been countersigned by Prime Minister Necas.

A similar controversial case emerged in Poland in late However, the appeal procedure in the case had not yet been completed. Although the case seemed to highlight hypocrisy in the ruling party — which promised harder sentences for child abuse while refraining from taking a clear stance against scandals in the Catholic church — at first glance, the case was more complicated than that.

In fact, the pardon only pertained to a restraining order and was supported by the family in question as well as the prosecutor general. Apart from granted pardons, pardon requests themselves or pardons not granted rarely make the headlines in Europe. Both had been sentenced to prison for life N. In , Klar first petitioned the then Federal President Johannes for a pardon, yet this was not granted at the time and the decision postponed.

Federal presidents now only rarely concern themselves personally with such requests. The use of pardons has not yet reached the same level of public controversy in Europe as it has in the United States.

Nevertheless, just like the pardons granted by Donald Trump during his presidency, the above examples from Czechia and Poland highlight the potential for misuse of a presidential prerogative that is only inconsistently checked and the exercise of which is often only limited by tradition or precedent.

Finally, there is also great variation in how transparent presidential offices are about clemency decisions. While the Slovak presidency maintains a database with a short anonymised account of each pardon granted link here — in Slovak , several presidential offices do not even publish statistics on the number of pardons granted or requests received.

Germany and Portugal. First, already visible during the presidential campaign, it was becoming clear that his leadership style would be different from his female predecessor because of his individual characteristics. So far, it appears that this tall order goal is largely constrained to presidential rhetoric, abstractions, and generalizations that are devoid of specifics because a detailed action plan on how the president intends to achieve this noble goal remains unclear.

Even political scientists are skeptical if, how, and when the welfare state in Lithuania may be achieved.

Some suggested that it was a strategic calculation by the presidential office to avoid the situation when it wins a battle at a potentially great political cost namely, the return of intra-institutional standoffs , but eventually loses the war since there is a good chance that the current coalition of political parties in parliament will again celebrate victory in the October parliamentary elections. If such a scenario were to unfold, the president would have burnt bridges and would face four years of deadlocks or impasses.

First, the president had a limited number of appearances in public during the crisis compared to the constant presence that the prime minister and especially the minister of health enjoyed in various media venues; subsequently both politicians saw their approval ratings skyrocket with expected drop in post-pandemic environment [7]. All this signaled to the public that the president had inadequate compression of the situation and also lacked sincere expression that he cared for the state and the people.

Specifically, presidential bills if passed by parliament will provide financial assistance to families with young children giving them a one-time payment of euros and temporarily reduce income taxes.

Obviously, suggesting new laws is a good step, but it is not enough; passing laws involves continuous and intensive work by the president with the parliament and the government, something that still appears to be a weak feature of the current presidential team.

With the increase in the number of semi-presidential systems Elgie , 13 and direct presidential elections Bormann and Golder since the end of the s, non-partisan presidents are now quite common around the world Elgie and McMenamin However, literature on the factors that explain their electoral success attracting significant shares of votes and winning the elections and popularity is quite scarce.

There is an argument that under a weak presidency, parties will be reluctant to waste time and resources on the second-order elections, as the size of the presidential prize is too small Hicken and Stoll ; Hicken and Stoll When the competition from the established parties decreases, non-partisan candidates may be more encouraged to participate in the elections Elgie et al.

However, this argument is not theoretically sufficient. It focuses on the supply strategies of parties and institutional factors powers of presidency , but leaves out the demand: views and values of society. Lithuania is a convenient case for the debate on the non-partisan presidents. Since the transition to democracy, only two presidents had a party attachment: Algirdas M. Brazauskas and Rolandas Paksas Lithuania stands out among the post-communist countries with similar government systems, such as Poland, Romania or Bulgaria, where the majority of presidents had party affiliations.

Presidency is not very weak or ceremonial: the Lithuanian president enjoys average Sedelius ; Raunio and Sedelius powers when compared to the similar post-communist democracies. The average percent of non-partisan candidates in the Lithuanian presidential elections was However, the average share of their votes in the first round was It is not that Lithuanian parties do not care about elections: we can clearly see that voters tend to choose the non-partisans.

There are additional institutional and supply-side factors that contribute to the electoral success of non-partisan candidates in presidential elections. Presidential and parliamentary elections in Lithuania are non-concurrent; therefore, parties are weaker during the presidential elections due to the hyper-accountability and partisan candidates have fewer incentives to join the political parties.

President's address on vaccination, situation on the border and energy security. President of Ukraine had a phone conversation with the Prime Minister of Georgia 12 November - President had a phone conversation with the President of Lithuania 11 November - Home News Current events. Image source, Getty Images. President Dalia Grybauskaite addresses reporters. Read full media profile. Parade to mark the 25th anniversary of the restoration of independence held in Vilnius in Read full timeline.

Related Topics. On Tuesday, the President addressed world leaders at the plenary session. The President welcomed international conference on the 30th anniversary of diplomatic relations between Lithuania and Russia. Are good-neighborly relations possible? The President at the commemoration of the Great Action: we have a moral duty to speak up for those who have lost their voice. The two Presidents discussed bilateral relations and cooperation in the fields of defense and regional security as well as in the Nordic-Baltic format.

A meeting between the leaders of the three Baltic States to be held in Vilnius. The President congratulates Poland on Independence Day. Write to the President of the Republic of Lithuania. Newsletter subscription er. Daukanto a.