| Author (Person) | Leonard, Dick |
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| Series Title | European Voice |
| Series Details | Vol.8, No.5, 7.2.02, p11 |
| Publication Date | 07/02/2002 |
| Content Type | News |
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Date: 07/02/02 Despite falling behind other candidate countries in terms of the number of chapters it has closed, Estonia is still a serious contender for joining the EU, argues Dick Leonard ARE Estonia's membership negotiations with the EU in serious trouble? For a long time, the Baltic nation was regarded as the ideal candidate, and was leading the pack in terms of chapters provisionally closed. Now it is well down the field, and has even been overtaken by its two neighbours - Latvia and Lithuania - even though their negotiations started nearly two years later. During the whole six months of the Belgian presidency, only one chapter (competition policy) was closed by Estonia. Little progress was made on chapters such as the free movement of persons, taxation and customs union, where other comparable applicant states had forged ahead. The suspicion grew that Estonia was deliberately slowing down the process, an impression which was reinforced by the large number of transition periods (30) and exceptions (40) that it had requested in the nine chapters currently being negotiated. The longest transition period it requested concerned the quality of urban drinking water, which would last until 2013 - the EU has now agreed to this. Further doubts were raised by the sudden resignation last month of Prime Minister Mart Laar, who had pioneered the Estonian application. This provoked fears that there would be a prolonged and destabilising interregnum while a new coalition was sought. But Laar's resignation had nothing to do with the issue of EU membership. As leader of the Pro Patria Party, he was upset that his main coalition partner, the Centre Party, had linked up with the opposition Reform Party to overthrow the governing coalition on the Tallinn city council. He regarded this as a breach of trust, and felt that he could not work any longer in harness with the centrists. Estonian President Arnold Rüütel acted swiftly to resolve the issue, asking Finance Minister Siin Kallas, the leader of the Centre Party, to form a new government. This he did, without difficulty, bringing in the Reform Party to replace Pro Patria and the small Moderate Party, both of which went into opposition. The new government, which is just short of a majority, is perhaps very slightly more left-wing than its predecessor, but is not expected to deviate very far from its central objectives. Nor is it embarking upon any purge of appointed officials: in particular, Alar Streimann, the respected chief negotiator with the EU, was promptly confirmed in office. Kallas, whose government is expected to remain in office until the general election due in March 2003, announced on 29 January that his top priority would be to conclude the accession talks by the end of this year, and promised, as head of government, 'to see to it that the negotiations run smoothly'. This should mean a rapid catching-up operation by the Estonians. For the reason they fell behind last year was not really related to difficulties in the negotiating chapters. It had more to do with sharp fluctuations in public opinion. As former Economics Minister Henrik Holokei put it in a recent lecture in Brussels, the opinion polls were going up and down like a yo-yo. From highs of 85 or more, support for EU membership fell to as low as 34, only to bound up overnight by ten percentage points when Estonia won the Eurovision Song Contest. The former government was criticised for closing too many chapters too quickly, and it was claimed that they could have got better deals by hanging out longer. As a tactical response, they then held back from closing further chapters, even though these were virtually completed. An important influence in restoring support in the polls was the election last September of the respected septuagenarian Arnold Rüütel as president. He has a wide following among elderly and more rural voters, who have tended to be the most sceptical concerningthe EU. His repeated backing for the Estonian application has had a positive effect, and the proportion in favour has risen to 58. The European Commission believes that there are only two major obstacles specifically concerning Estonia in the remaining negotiations. One is the energy chapter, in which Estonia (which has otherwise already removed all its customs barriers) wishes to retain protection for its oil shale industry, which currently supplies 90 of its energy needs. It is the only country in the world to exploit oil shale deposits for this purpose, and it is not a very economical - or environmentally friendly - process. Nevertheless, it is virtually Estonia's only natural resource, and it is concentrated in the eastern part of the country, which has the highest unemployment level, as well as the largest proportion of Russian speakers. The social consequences of closing down the industry would be disastrous, it is argued. The other serious difficulty relates to Estonia's small population - under 1.4 million. This figure represents less than 4 of Poland's, but Estonia still has to transpose the same number of laws and regulations (amounting to more than 60,000 pages in the Official Journal) as its larger fellow candidate, and this is proving an enormous burden on its over-stretched administration. The EU recently recognised this problem by increasing the level of its financial support for administrative reform in the smaller candidate countries. Estonia is no happier than other candidate countries about the Commission proposal, published last week, to stagger the introduction of agricultural and regional aid over ten years. This measure has been severely criticised in the Estonian press. and could still cause difficulties, but otherwise Estonia, whose own economic reform programme started earlier and went much further than in any other applicant country, remains the best placed to take maximum advantage of the opportunities that EU membership will bring. The scorecard gives a misleadingly modest impression of the state of its preparations. Major feature. Despite falling behind other candidate countries in terms of the number of chapters it has closed, author argues that Estonia is still a serious contender for joining the EU. |
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