Kaun Banega Maha CM ! - Lithuanian elections 2024

                                “Kaun banega Maharashtra ka CM?" –  the Q  is reverberating as   Maharashtra has delivered a clear and thumping result.    Will it be Devendra Fadnavis or Eknath Shinde? Despite the Mahayuti's landslide victory, the BJP has remained silent on the announcement of the next Chief Minister.

 

Immediately after the debacle – Team Thackeray announced ‘Congress's Overconfidence Cost Us":  The Congress contested 103 seats but won only 16. The Sena (UBT), which contested 89 seats, managed to win 20 seats.   The Congress's "overconfidence" in Maharashtra and its "attitude" during seat-sharing talks hurt Maha Vikas Aghadi's prospects, a senior leader of Shiv Sena (UBT) has said a week after the Opposition bloc was routed in the state polls. The BJP-led Mahayuti scored a thumping victory in the election, winning 230 seats in the 288-member Assembly. 

A post on Elections elsewhere !!  The Treaty of Salynas  was a peace treaty signed on 12 October 1398 by Vytautas the Great, the Grand Duke of Lithuania, and Konrad von Jungingen, the Grand Master of the Teutonic Knights. It was signed on an islet of the Neman River, probably between Kulautuva and the mouth of the Nevėžis River.  It was the third time, after the Treaty of Königsberg (1384) and Treaty of Lyck (1390), that Vytautas promised Samogitia to the Knights. The territory was important to the Knights as it physically separated the Teutonic Knights in Prussia from its branch in Livonia.  However, it did not solve the territorial disputes over Samogitia and they dragged on until the Treaty of Melno in 1422. 

The Prime minister of Lithuania is the head of government of Lithuania. The prime minister is appointed by the president with the assent of the Lithuanian parliament, the Seimas. The modern office of prime minister was established in 1990, when Lithuania declared its independence, although the official title was "Chairperson of the Council of Ministers" until 25 November 1992. Historically, the title of prime minister was also used between 1918 and 1940. This was during the original Republic of Lithuania, which lasted from the collapse of the Russian Empire until the country's annexation by the Soviet Union. 

Lithuania  is a country in the Baltic region of Europe. It is one of three Baltic states and lies on the eastern shore of the Baltic Sea, bordered by Latvia, Belarus,  and the Russian semi-exclave of Kaliningrad Oblast,  with a maritime border with Sweden.  Its capital and largest city is Vilnius. Other major cities are Kaunas, Klaipėda, Šiauliai and Panevėžys. Lithuanians belong to the ethnolinguistic group of the Balts and speak Lithuanian. 

The 2024 Lithuanian parliamentary election was held on 13 and 27 October 2024 to elect the 141 members of the Seimas. Parliament members were elected in 71 single-member constituencies using the two-round system, and the remaining 70 in a single nationwide constituency using proportional representation. The elections were won by the Social Democratic Party of Lithuania (LSDP), which secured 19.32% of the popular vote and 52 seats, up from 9.58% and 13 seats in the previous elections in 2020. The Homeland Union (TS–LKD), the largest party in the ruling centre-right coalition in the preceding Seimas, finished a distant second, securing 28 seats, down from its previous 50. 

The Seimas of the Republic of Lithuania   is the unicameral legislative body of the Republic of Lithuania. The Seimas constitutes the legislative branch of government in Lithuania, enacting laws and amendments to the Constitution, passing the budget, confirming the Prime Minister and the Government and controlling their activities. Its 141 members are elected for a four-year term, with 71 elected in individual constituencies, and 70 elected in a nationwide vote based on open list proportional representation.  A party must receive at least 5%, and a multi-party union at least 7%, of the national vote to qualify for the proportional representation seats. Following the elections in 2024, the Social Democratic Party of Lithuania is the largest party in the Seimas, signing an agreement to form a coalition government with the Union of Democrats "For Lithuania" and the Dawn of Nemunas. 

Gintautas Paluckas has been  elected the 18th prime minister of Lithuania, succeeding Ingrida Šimonytė. Paluckas was Deputy Mayor of Vilnius from 2015 to 2019 and the leader of the Lithuanian Social Democratic Party (LSDP) from 2017 to 2021. Paluckas led his party in the 2020 parliamentary election and won a seat in the Seimas. In 2024, as the Deputy Leader of the party, Paluckas participated in the Lithuanian parliamentary election, which was won by the LSDP. As a result, he was nominated as a candidate for the position of Prime Minister of Lithuania. 

Ingrida Šimonytė is an  economist who served as the 17th prime minister of Lithuania since 2020. She has been a Member of the Seimas for the Antakalnis constituency since 2016 and was Minister of Finance in the second Kubilius cabinet from 2009 until 2012. Šimonytė was a candidate in the 2019 and 2024 presidential election, but lost in the second round runoff to Gitanas Nausėda both times. She has been a member of Homeland Union since 2022, having previously been an independent politician.

 
Regards – S Sampathkumar
28.11.2024