Coalition nominates Valdis Zatlers for President

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 02 RIGA 000392

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: N/A
TAGS: PGOV PINR PREL LG
SUBJECT: Coalition nominates Valdis Zatlers for President



1. Summary: On May 22, the ruling coalition announced that they were
not able to reach agreement on either of the two presidential
candidates - Karina Petersone (Latvia's First Party/Latvia's Way)
and Maris Riekstins (People's Party) - and nominated a new
presidential candidate - Valdis Zatlers. Zatlers is not an official
member of any political party and there is no recent information on
his political affiliations, though he categorized himself to a
reporter as a "conservative". Zatlers is a surgeon and head of the
National Trauma and Orthopedic Hospital. If all MPs (58) of the
ruling coalition vote for Zatlers, he would acquire the required
support (51 votes) to become president. However, the Saeima elects
the president by secret ballot and, due to the coalition's slim
majority, the outcome is unpredictable. The last minute entry of
former constitutional court chief Aivars Endzins further complicates
the path ahead. End of Summary.


2. Valdis Zatlers was born on 22 March 1955, in Riga. In 1979, he
graduated from Riga Medical Institute. He spent a year as a visiting
scholar in the US in 1990 at Yale University and Syracuse
University. He has been working as a surgeon since 1979, and has
been the head of the National Trauma and Orthopedic Hospital since

1994. Zatlers has leading positions in two associations: as
president of the Latvian Arthroscopy Association and vice-president
of the Latvian Orthopedics Association. Though he is prominent in
the area of medical practice, he is not known for being actively
involved in the re-organization of the health care sector, which is
considered one of the most difficult and unsettled sectors for
reform in Latvia. His only known previous political involvement was
serving as a board member of the Popular Front (Tautas fronte) from
1988-1989, when it was agitating for Latvian independence from the
Soviet Union.


3. Though in general his public profile has been very low, Zatlers
received considerable attention in the media in March 2003. On the
basis of a report by the KNAB (Anti-Corruption Bureau) which
recommended bringing criminal charges against Zatlers for abuse of
office, then-Health Minister Aris Auders (New Era) suspended Zatlers
as head of the hospital. Zatlers was accused of purchasing
low-quality implants for the hospital from the companies of his wife
and a colleague. After a short period, and without any new evidence,
then-Prime Minister Einars Repse (New Era) unexpectedly ordered
Auders to reinstate Zatlers. A month later, it was concluded that
the implants corresponded to the required quality, and the criminal
case was closed in May 2006. Throughout the scandal, Zatlers
received the broad public support of the hospital's doctors and
staff. Interestingly, two months before the conflict, the People's
Party had asked for the resignation of Health Minister Auders, which
was later construed as an attempt to protect Zatlers from audits of
his hospital by Dainis Titavs, advisor to Prime Minister Repse.


4. Zatlers is also taking press heat for his admission that he
accepted additional payment from patients beyond the normal fees.
Zatlers says that he never asked for the money, but did not decline
it when patients offered it. Zatlers is saying that he should get
credit for being truthful about the situation and noted that unlike
some of his colleagues, he never demanded money to give patients'
higher priority on waiting lists. Nevertheless, the more liberal
media and non-political elite are criticizing the notion of a
President who has admitted to taking such money and almost certainly
did not pay taxes on it. (Comment: The Latvian public is unlikely
to see this as anything unusual in a doctor, but it is not clear if
they would view this as a negative for a head of state. End
comment.)


5. The media also reports on two smaller conflicts, both with public
authorities, involving Zatlers. In November 2002, Zatlers
demonstrated an unyielding position in a dispute with the National
Health Insurance Agency. He announced that the hospital would be
closed and no patients accepted if the National Health Insurance
Agency did not pay its debt to the hospital. The parties eventually
reached an agreement. In December 2003, Zatlers was criticized by
the Ministry of Health for his statement that the hospital was not
able to manage extra funding. Afterwards, Zatlers announced that
there had been some misunderstandings and that the hospital had the
capacity to manage additional funding.


6. Comment: The announcement by the coalition parties that they were
not able to reach agreement on their previously announced and
publicly-debated presidential candidates confirmed the predicted
scenario that in fact there have been two parallel processes: public
nomination of presidential candidates and closed discussions among
members of a very narrow circle of the political elite. Though the
appearance of a non-discussed candidate had been expected, the
identification of Zatlers as that candidate has brought some
surprise and criticism, in particular, for his lack of political
experience (both foreign and domestic) and for being outside of any
political party. Commentators have remarked that his candidacy is
just "a compromise of party ambitions" and that the prior submission
of candidates was a theater in "an effort to fool the nation that
democracy does exist in this country". Zatlers did himself no
favors when a reporter asked him to name three reasons why he wanted
to be president and he could only respond with one ("I have the
ability to communicate, listen and make decisions. I wouldn't want

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to praise myself more than that"). The main concern voiced by civil
society groups and the media is that there is no information
available on his views and stances on issues.

Waser