Viktor Uspaskich: yes, a coalition with the conservatives – possible

Uspaskich also admits that he likes Prime Minister Saulius Skvernelis because he was the only one who did not yield to President Dalia Grybauskaitė.

“Of all the prime ministers I have dealt with, Skvernel is the best for me. Compared to Kubilius and Butkevičius (I will not speak about Algirdas Brazauskas). When Grybauskaitė tried it drive, immediately made it clear that she would not be under his sole. I liked. He was able to put it in its place, ”says the politician in an interview with Delfi.

– Russia has finished the referendum on constitutional amendments that allow Vladimir Putin to remain in power until 2036. How do you evaluate those results? What do they testify?

– Honestly, I didn’t observe those events. I know a referendum took place, but I didn’t even look at what and how.

I don’t think that promises anything good for the Russian state. I think the president can show his abilities in two terms of power, like in the United States. That would be enough

After all, the potential of each person’s ideas diminishes in the long run. It doesn’t take a lifetime to realize your vision. If we talk about governance, we just have to do the work that I wanted to do, and quite a bit.

– Why do you think Russian society has been supporting Putin for the third decade?

– I think people don’t have objective information. They see no alternatives, there are no other leaders. Alternative leaders do not have an opportunity to express themselves. When opportunities to learn more arise, people begin to think differently.

Russia’s territory is very large, and there is almost no opportunity for a government opponent to visit all areas to present themselves. I can cross all of Lithuania and gather my fans, and in Russia it would be very difficult to do so. People there form an opinion of what they hear, what is presented to them in the public space. And they seem to have a better option [už Putiną] There is not.

– Perhaps Russian society does not need democracy at all? Why do you want authoritarianism so much?

– Democracy is a difficult thing. Introducing the Labor Party program, I said that culture should be the first item on any government’s agenda. And culture is not a glass of wine in a theater or restaurant. Culture is the creation of the world, of the entire country, thinking on a global scale, educating people.

When there is no culture, when human consciousness is animal, it is the state in which we are born, and then we have to cultivate. If we do not educate, the conscience of democracy remains without education. After all, power is a reflection of society. And if society has no education, then choose that power, and it is this power that begins to represent it.

The current ruling majority in Lithuania is not the worst. Prime Minister Saulius Skvernelis is, I think, one of the best. It has a backbone that Prime Ministers Algirdas Butkevičius and Andrius Kubilius did not have.

When we do not have that education and society is not educated from kindergarten and school, power is chosen as a reflection of that society.

– Are you talking more about Lithuania or Russia now?

– I am talking about Lithuania, but the situation is basically no different. We can try to overshadow, hide what is happening to us. We are lucky to be members of the EU: we have taken a lot of culture, democracy and democratic institutions from Europe. We are supervised from there. We have some such fuses.

If we were not members of the EU and the president was Dalia Grybauskait no, I am not sure that we would not have Putin’s version in Lithuania.

After independence, the socdemas and the conservatives formed an army of officials. It has recently emerged that the movement against the Astrava nuclear power plant is organizing a Cuban opposition. If Uspaskich had done so, it would have been a great scandal. Or if the document approving the construction of the Astrava nuclear power plant had been signed by a representative from another party, not Kubilius, together with the Prime Minister of Belarus. Don’t give up, God, the Labor Party.

– Are there double standards in Lithuania?

– Double standard and simple [grupės] impunity. Here [Lietuva ir Rusija] Not very different. Therefore, during the presentation of the Labor Party program, I said that these double standards must be removed.

– What political forces in Lithuania benefit from these double standards?

– They really are not good for Lithuania. They benefit conservatives and socdems. It is true that the socdems are now divided. I am speaking first of those who graduated from high schools.

– Bebrus?

– Yes, “beavers”. Changing an opinion as many times a day as Butkevičius changed does not lead to good.

– Do Gintautas Paluckas’ socdemas seem better to you?

– I think so. Those grandparents who are still there will soon retire, and the clean socialists will occupy the niche on the left. It is true, I cannot say that I agree with the left: sharing what is not earned is populism. I always suggest making money first, and only then sharing.

Conservatives, socialists only want to be in power for power. Liberals too: they were twice in the ruling majority and never offered or defended anything more liberal. All of these parts, even following double standards, could at least make Lithuania happier. But don’t do it.

– Conservatives already have two terms: in opposition. Where then is your influence?

– Because the army of officers – yours.

– Do you think the army of officials is conservative?

– Mixed with socdemas, but conservative – more.

– Why?

– Because the army of officers was formed when the conservatives were in power. They ruled until 1992, when the army of civil servants, the judiciary, was formed. Then came the socdemas. The representatives of these two parties were not very far from each other: they were both communists and communists, only some later went to the conservatives and others to the Socdems.

When the Conservatives became the ruling party in 1996, they leaked everything very sharply. And now, in the municipalities where the mayors are socdems or conservatives, it is very difficult for a person from elsewhere to find work. There, a peculiar dictatorship.

– Is the dictatorship probably where the mayors of the Labor Party are or have been?

– We try to do the same. But we had no mayors.

– It was that you had some of your mayors the whole time.

– There were few mayors. In Kėdainiai, Ukmergė, Telšiai. Everything.

– What about Širvintos?

– In Širvintos, she had already gone her own way. And when I became a minister, I did not forgive any conservative nor do we agree. I brought them together and encouraged them to work according to the ideology I proposed and the program to be implemented. I did not forgive anyone.

– You mentioned the movement against the Astrava nuclear power plant. What is your position at Astravo Electricity? Fight along with that movement?

– Logic must be enabled. It is good that we have not registered, because now that all those things about Cuba are starting to come in, the conversations under the table are very happy that we have not stagnated.

In general, I am against nuclear energy. It has a negative effect on human health, and not only due to radiation leakage. Within a radius of only fifty kilometers around a nuclear power plant, the frequencies that act on a person change.

And before that he was in favor of building a nuclear power plant in Lithuania. I agreed with Kubil and the conservatives that it should be built with the Japanese Hitachi. I campaigned for all this, although I was in opposition.

But when I started to delve into my current philosophy, I stopped drinking, eating meat, became interested and learned the need to observe not only radiation, but also the environment that is negatively affected.

And now, through quarantine, scientists have calculated that due to the reduced movement of various techniques, Earth has become more than 30 percent. calmer, not as underdog as before quarantine.

Now, for the Astrava nuclear power plant, there are already spoons in the afternoon, and I think we should integrate as much as possible into that structure and fight for a safe operation. They [baltarusiai]As I understand it, he allowed and invited to do so. And you just need to buy cheaper electricity. After all, we will still buy it. Especially if they buy Estonians and Latvians. There is no smell of electricity.

– So you do not agree with the ideas of the movement against the Astravo nuclear power plant?

– I haven’t examined the whole situation. If I were in the position where decisions are made, I would examine everything. And the information we get from the media is not enough.

– Are you talking about the office of prime minister?

– yeah

– But do you admit that the chances of your party winning the elections are very low?

I understand that it is up to God to become Prime Minister. God is looking at whether Lithuania needs a prime minister today or not. A good prime minister is the best of all.

– Imagine that your party is in a ruling coalition with conservative crickets. They demand an increase in budget allocations for national defense to 2.5%. Would you agree

– Probably not. Up to 2 percent. – I would definitely agree. We say this also in our program. We need to have a modern army. So small, [pasirengusią] the most important things. It is good that we are members of NATO, defense costs us less.

It is necessary to see if defense spending is being used effectively. The world has already seen that armaments alone lead nowhere. I am sure that buying tanks will be neither useful nor fashionable. Preparations should be made for a more effective use of defense capabilities.

According to the Labor Party program, we must fight for peace. Lithuania should become an island of peace. And our geographical position, between Russia and America, is very good in this regard.

– What if Russia does not want and does not want peace?

– You don’t want peace when the other side doesn’t want it. Victor Frankley, who was imprisoned in a concentration camp, said very well: if you want a person to be better, his conscience increases, then the trajectory of the attitude towards him must be greater. And if you see it as it is all the time, you will drop it and get even more aggression from it. The trajectory of the approach to a person should be higher, and then his hands will have flowers instead of an automatic weapon.

Our current President is quite adequate in this regard. Before that there was aggression and deliberate provocation, selfishness. This can not be done.

When the President of Belarus was praised during the Minsk negotiation process, he even released political prisoners, began to flirt and communicate more. Europe has raised its attitudes trajectory, and Alexander Lukashenko has improved somewhat.

– How do you assess the state of the Lukashenko regime and how do you think the presidential elections in Belarus will end?

– I would like to change in Belarus, Ukraine and Russia.

– How are they already happening in Ukraine?

– Don’t give up, God. There should be no Maidan. There must be democratic elections. People need to have more access to what their opponents have to offer.

I would like Belarus, Ukraine, Russia, Europe to unite. Make them all members of the EU. It is very important to me. I was born in Russia My father is Ukrainian I live in Lithuania My children were born in Belarus.

– Such a merger is almost impossible. The values ​​of the EU are incompatible with the values ​​of present-day Russia and Belarus.

– And the EU has different values. For example, due to the dismissal of one of my assistants, I was never summoned to court, but the court subpoenaed me when the sentence was passed. That is the European Court of Justice. After all, if he does quote me, he had to invite me, at least to ask them. So there are also strange things in Europe.

– Strange things happen everywhere, they hardly come together. The EU respects human rights and we must respect them. Russia ignores them.

– I would not like to invest money in Russia. There, businesses do not depend on market conditions, but on whether it rains or not, and on political decisions. Market laws don’t work there. Changes are needed. However [alternatyvių] Leaders are not seen there.

– Last year, there was a program on Freedom Radio, where participants recounted how Boris Nemtsov asked Putin a couple of decades ago, to whom he returned the hymn of the Soviet Union. “What a country, that’s the way songs are,” Putin replied. How do you think his response shows his attitude towards Russian society as immature and deserving of authoritarianism?

– Yes, it can be said that society is just that. In a terrible dream, I would not dream that someone in my environment would speak well of Stalin. And in Russia – language. Although there are victims and eradicated intelligence …

– How to explain this?

– Darkness

– Let’s go back to Lithuania. A political scientist recently said that after the Seimas elections, the Labor Party would form a coalition with the conservatives because Uspaskich needs forgiveness of sins, and only Vytautas Landsbergis can forgive them. So will you join the conservatives so Landsberg will forgive your sins?

– No. I don’t have so many sins that I was connected with the conservatives for their forgiveness. And my philosophy is that I just don’t care what about me. Therefore, I do not need any forgiveness.

Yes, a coalition with the conservatives is possible. Because there are many liberal things out there. But I can say that I am impressed by the way Skvernell runs the government. He impresses me. He is a man who has a spinal column and is not under the sole like his predecessors.

– You say you’re impressed with Squirrel. But if you were in a coalition with the conservatives, Ingrida Šimonytė would probably become prime minister. Is it worse or better for you than Squirrel?

– When she was Minister of Finance, Kubilius offered to speak to her. We talked for a couple of hours. I presented my economic vision. I did not hear any objection. But that is all. I have the impression that she does not handle the situation, does not make decisions.

As it is now, I don’t know. But I also don’t know what your software settings are, what you want to do. If it’s the same thing he had already done, why should he come back to power again? After all, Lithuania did not make people happy, it did not make people happy.

“Would it be better for you to work with Squirrel or Shimonyte?”

– Of all the prime ministers I have dealt with, Skvernel is the best for me. Compared to Kubilius and Butkevičius (I will not speak of Algirdas Brazauskas). When Grybauskaitė tried it drive in he immediately made it clear that she would not be under his sole. I liked. He was able to put it in its place.

If a program were agreed with Skvernel, there would be a chance that that program would be implemented.

– But the party president is Ramūnas Karbauskis.

– You know, Karbauskis and the peasants were very lucky in 2016 that Skvernelis accompanied them, and now. If it was not, it is still unclear whether the peasants would not be below the Labor Party.