RSSCommentary on Political Life in Latvia
Nov 04
Uncategorized Comments Off
Subdued Revolution
Nov 03
Originally posted on Latvians Online
Today’s protest disappointed me as I stood in the snow and high winds listening to what appeared to be a choral concert with a frequent interlude for public speaking – I wouldn’t call them passionate oratories – about matters of the state.
My disappointment stems from the apparent lack of fervor, passion, and conviction among those 7,000 or 9,000 who braved the first snow and came out to the Dome Square in the Old Riga.
They say it’s the weather’s fault.
How it would have been appropriate to use the first snow as a metaphor for the dying of the old way and preparing for the new. But it didn’t seem to fit.
It didn’t fit because the air filled with snowflakes was empty of revolutionary spirit and the chilling wind was not the wind of change I had hoped for.
It was a polite, “Mm, remember us? We’re the people,” composed together with the already-notorious Latvian pessimism.
Even with the Loskutovs case set aside on the government’s back burner for a while, people in the crowd and the speakers on the stage seemed to have forgotten the success the October 18th protest has already brought.
And who’s kidding? We all have something to complain about.
Aside stood, what local Russians call “tautas meitas,” a traditional row of female elderly citizens who protest against – well, anything really. Farther down the road, some guy demanded the EU stop telling us what rate we exchange our lats to their euros. I mean, if our economy should crumble, we’d rather do it ourselves. Lettish nationalists come out to play in the snow as well – they demanded, among other things, protecting this country from new immigration. In the back, a group of local Russians gathered to protest against the denationalised apartments from which they might be kicked out. Of course, the call everyone remembers—“Dissolve the parliament…”
What polite little revolutionaries we are, a poet once said. Did it send a strong signal to the Kalvitis government that it needs to go? Not any more so than the president’s words on Friday when he said the government without four ministers cannot work. Was it the beginning of change in the political culture? Too soon to tell, I think. For now, though, there is no viable alternatives to the current four-party coalition.
I’ve read the resolution adopted at the tautas sapulce. It is filled with great slogans I could get behind about justice, rule of law, democracy in Latvia. I just am not sure what practical consequences this resolution would have. New government with old faces? Another election?
Maybe that’s how revolutions are done nowadays.
Photo from the people’s gathering this morning on the Dome Square in Old Riga taken from apollo.lv
Update: Juris Kaza posted a video from Saturday’s Subdued Revolution.
Recent Comments