Author: Ilona Bērziņa
Ainārs Šlesers has no doubts he will become the next Mayor of Riga in municipal elections this summer. He also has no doubts about his party’s future success in the 15th Saeima elections in autumn 2026, adding that he is prepared to take the reins as Latvia’s Prime Minister. BNN invited Ainārs Šlesers to an interview to ask him about his vision for Riga, limitation of bureaucracy, the country’s transit policy, the “Green Course”, ways to overcome the demographic abyss and many other topics.
The ruling coalition often use you and your party “Latvian in First Place” as a sort of boogeyman. They often say “Šlesers will win, and then you’ll see”. How would you comment on that?
The answer in English is very short – Game is Over. After the victory of Donald Trump in US Presidential elections, this government’s and this ideology’s days are numbered. They can unite in any way they like in this composition, but I believe that if Latvia wants a bright future, we have to cooperate with Trump’s America. But our current government is incapable of that, because Trump won’t work with this liberal power. He is very careful in choosing cooperation partners in different countries. Prime Minister of Italy Giorgia Meloni travelled to America, met with Trump, formed good relations and was invited to his inauguration. The same happens with other European leaders. If Latvia wants to form good relations with US, which is critical to our safety, then the government needs to change.
I believe in our party will win in Riga’s municipal elections in four months from now. I will become Mayor of Riga, and in October 2026 we will be celebrating a great victory in the Saeima. There is a high probability that no “Unity” will be able to overcome the 5% barrier. They proved themselves as an unprofessional, bureaucratic organisation. Everything that is now happening with airBaltic, Rail Baltica, as well as many other projects, only proves that their time is over. We have to put a stop to all this in our country, and I am prepared to do this.
But you cannot deny that your name on the list of Latvia in First Place would only increase the party’s chances in the next Saeima elections. Maybe it would be a better idea to not rush with becoming Mayor of Riga?
These are two separate things. One is being in opposition and criticising others, the other is working to pull Latvia from drowning in a marsh. By lifting up Riga, we will lift up Latvia, because Riga is half of Latvia’s economy. This is why I’m going to Riga – to demonstrate the difference we can achieve in one year’s time.
The situation has escalated, Mayor of Riga Vilnis Ķirsis has no support from the public. His results are, mildly putting it, weak. This was a unique city council – deputies were given five years, but they haven’t accomplished anything. I don’t mean everyday things – streets are being cleaned, pot holes are being patched, but there are no major investments will be left after them. This is why I believe my work in Riga City Council will be more visible than work in the Saeima.
We’re not dependent on such state or public media like “Panorāma” or “Latvijas Radio”. When we are invited, we go there. But that’s it. We have put together our our media group on social networks, where our party has enough followers. For example, we have 72 000 followers on Tik-Tok. No other party has as many. I have 60 000 followers on Facebook. Many of our people are active on social networks. We use YouTube, Instagram and others. We are both visible and audible every day. If I become mayor, people will see and hear me even more often.
One of Latvia’s biggest problem is excessive bureaucracy and bloated civil service. Is there a recipe to fix this?
The problem is that we are drowning in poverty. For 2025, we ave a state budget in which revenue is estimated at EUR 15.1 billion and expenditures are at EUR 17.1 billion. This means two billions are out. Our neighbour Estonia plans to earn EUR 17.7 billion and spend EUR 18.1 billion this year. If we compare numbers, Latvia earns EUR 2.6 billion less than Estonia. But Estonia’s population is 500 000 smaller than Latvia’s, and if this country’s population was equal to Latvia’s 1.8 million, their revenue would be EUR 24 billion. For us to reach Estonia’s level, to say nothing of other European countries, we are approximately EUR 9 billion short in taxes.
This proves our economy is “in the pits”, and we have to change absolutely everything there.
The idea is very simple – we have to cut the number of “white collars” by 30% in the country, because there are too many civil servants, too much bureaucracy. As the state auditor put it – there are six institutions that operate with real estate affairs. Six! We can’t simply fire people, but we can reorganise the institutions by merging them. A portion of workers would be released as a result of reorganisation. Because there is a shortage of qualified workers in Latvia’s economy, many civil servants would get an opportunity to prove themselves in the private sector. If they are so good and irreplaceable, let them work and earn taxes for Latvia. Because we need tax revenue to increase pensions, increase wages for teachers, police and medical workers.
We need to talk about Latvia’s need to introduce specialists, but the first place we can sacrifice is civil service. Secondly, we have to find a way to get back the people who have left Latvia. Only then can we look for ways to attract specialists from other countries. We need fundamental reorganisation. I believe Latvia’s residents are ready for it. People will have an opportunity to compare the government’s action or inaction, which was also something mentioned by President Edgars Rinkēvičs, when he said a year has passed but there hasn’t been a single reform in state administration. Reforms in Riga will be very rapid. What we will ensure as a priority is enormous investments into the capital city’s economy.
Among the specialists in demand the most are nurses, pre-school teachers, chefs, truck drivers, customer service specialists, concrete mixers. How many of the aforementioned 30% would qualify for these jobs?
No civil servant is guaranteed lifetime work in state governance. They should go and learn. They put together many different training courses for the unemployed, let them attend those courses themselves and do some actual work. No one needs all this work with paper and generation of empty reports. All this only serves to waste taxpayers’ money. For example, translating. As far as I know, there is demand for simultaneous translation services in Brussels. But modern technologies make it possible to translate any document using Google Translate. All you needs is a person to check and edit the text. This translation happens in a matter of seconds, and you can get relevant texts in English, German, Japanese, Chinese or any other language. The world has leaped forward in this regard. We have to use it.
Without a doubt, the country needs taxes. No employer organisation has ever said everything is fine with the business environment and there are no problems at all.
Let me tell you how I see the situation in Riga. After we win elections and I am approved as Mayor of Riga, I will slash the number of civil servants by 30%. I will do this very quickly. Those who will remain will be paid better wages. Those whose services will no longer be needed, will go work in the private sector.
I have participated in many seminars. At one of them, a businessman stood up and said the coordination procedure in relation to construction work takes at least three months in Latvia and less than a month in Estonia. When our civil servants travelled to Estonia to look how Estonians do things, they said – no, we need to check everything in more detail! Inspectors sit and check, leaving businessmen to bleed the whole time. If we cannot find a way to move forward on our own, we should copy models from Estonia, Lithuania or other countries. If they can do it in 30 days instead of 90, we could be able to do the same in 29 days. We have to become faster and better than our neighbours.
As mayor, I will compose an investment council and become its chairman.
I will call over all department and committee heads, LDDK and LTRK will become my main partners when it comes to private investments in Riga. For example, they say: there are tens of millions of investments, we want to build this and that. We then send out this information to everyone, and then I ask those are the meeting – who is in favour and who is against. If there are some who are against, please explain why. If the arguments are sound, we tell the business about the possible problems. But we cannot allow a situation when we say “yes”, and then one, two or three problems appear and the business refuses to invest in the end. Because if some civil servant tries to slow a project through baseless arguments, then the door is over there. But if the arguments are sound, then that’s a different story. But if there are any geniuses who ruined our architecture by building “Khrushchevkas” everywhere, they should sit there quietly.
My driving principle will be this: carrot in one hand to motivate people to work. Those who do a good job will be rewarded. In the other hand, however, a whip – if someone doesn’t work, I will point them to the door. The city council needs to work to support entrepreneurs. The city council needs to become a single-stop agency for businesses, and civil servants needs to understand that if they do not support residents and businesses – they should leave.
Aren’t you afraid that everyone you fire will sue you?
We won’t fire people – we will reorganise work places. It’s not like we will fire one and then hire someone else to take his or her place. If jobs are terminated, it means there are redundancies performed. This means a civil servants simply cannot go and say he or she was fired for no reason. But as I’ve said – the civil servants that do their jobs honestly and diligently have nothing to fear. It is those who were placed in posts simply because they have ties to political parties and do not actually go to work that should fear for their hides.
“Party plants” can be found in all sorts boards and councils of state and municipal companies, including ministry-delegated representatives in all three of Latvia’s biggest ports. They are there and are paid very impressive wages in most cases. What should be done with these people with ties to political parties?
Multiple councils should be liquidated entirely. They are unnecessary. I listened to an interview from State Secretary to the Ministry of Transport Andulis Židkovs, who said they will be replacing the airBaltic Council and that they will have a professional council instead. They will look for people with experience in engineering. I’m sorry, but a council has nothing to do with engineering! A council is a structure that supervises the work done by the board of directors. They are the ones who make sure if the approved business plan is in motion. And now they are going off the deep end with a search for engineers. Such a council is not needed at all. When Židkovs was asked his personal opinion about airBaltic, he said no, no, the council will decide that! So he has no opinion, Evika Siliņa doesn’t have an opinion as the head of the government, and so they will look for a council that will formulate an opinion! This is idiotic and demonstrates the inability to take responsibility.
If the prime minister sees that things are bad, she needs to act. The first thing she should do is fire [Minister of Transport Kaspars] Briškens, since it is clear he has managed to ruin everything in the last one and a half years, is not in control of anything and doesn’t understand anything.
And then there is his conflict of interests, because Briškens previously worked in airBaltic’s council and Rail Baltica, so he shouldn’t dig too deep or he’ll find himself at the root cause of everything. And so he covers for everyone else by covering for himself. The PM should come and say: “The minister is doing a bad job. Progressives, give us a professional minister! If you can’t, I’ll replace this party with a different one.” Replacing a minister also means replacing a different state secretary. I believe no council is necessary. There is a state secretary that will supervise the company’s work and will directly communicate with the state. Here we have a council that is irresponsible and is now leaving, having successfully written off EUR 571 million and having left all sorts of other problems, all the while playing the innocent in all this.
The system can function well if everything is fine. For example, if we lived in Switzerland and there was money to spare. But once the Titanic sinks, we suddenly need professionals. I believe this government has exhausted itself. We can see opposition parties are becoming more popular than ruling parties, and this is reflected in popularity polls. I believe Donald Trump’s victory in America marks the future Saeima elections will wash away the existing power.
Just recently we wanted to establish in the Constitution that there are only two genders – man and woman. Period. If there are people who are different, let them live how they like and let them do what they want from the age of eighteen. We cannot prohibit an adult from doing something. This is about ideology for children, kindergartens, schools, where they are forced to learn very questionable liberal values. The fact that the President of the United States signed a decree stating that there are two genders and that this will be America’s official position and policy means that the representatives of the US Embassy will also no longer be able to attend gay pride parades and demonstrate support. It will also be a challenge for our Green Farmers, who have become very blue. They will have to return to their old values or risk voters abandoning them.
Trump is not here for four years. The Republican Party has taken over power in America. They won’t remain for just four years. They might stay for eight, sixteen or more years. People are tired of all this liberalism. I believe that for us to join the new world order, Latvia needs a normal, professional and conservative government.
But at every next elections people give their votes fro New Unity and green farmers…
Let’s not forget Unity had a hard time in the previous Saeima. It just so happened that no one could compose a government and [Krišjānis] Kariņš became Prime Minister. At first they spent money left and right during covid pandemic. Everyone was trying to stay in power to receive benefits of some kind; then Russia invaded Ukraine and people were scared and held on to the hope that Kariņš, an American, will be able to help somehow. But Kariņš slept away all five years. As he put it himself, he didn’t know which aircraft he used and where he flew. He also said he knows nothing about Rail Baltica and airBaltic…
Unity has been in charge of this country for fifteen years, and we are in last place on nearly all economic indexes.
But at the same time we are pulling money through the Social Integration Fund and public media are being purchased. For example, why is it that Latvijas Radio’s regular guest experts are all sorosists and conservative values are pushed aside? I hope Trump will help public media understand that something needs to change. There are normal people working here, but they are the minority and they are forced to keep their mouths shut. Here I want to quote our opera singer Elīna Garanča, who mentioned in one of her interviews several years ago: “While previously I had to think what I should say about one topic or another in Europe because of sensitivity, I have to say that no one can speak those topics at all today.”
If you say you support conservative values and family values, that’s it – you are automatically branded a homophobe.
You’re not allowed to speak your mind about the values you support even if you support and respect the fact that some small number of people are different. It seems that we, who support traditional family values, have ended up in the minority, whereas those who force these liberal values are allowed to do whatever they want. For example, we gathered signatures in support of traditional families, but LTV and Latvijas Radio pretended there was no signature collection at all. Then there were protests. The people who gathered there were called names – alcoholics and drug addicts. This propaganda is destructive for us. When protests happened near LTV, not a single journalists went outside and asked questions. I believe modern-day media are bought by the government, as most of the people there are pupils of Sarmīte Ēlerte. I don’t remember seeing, for example, journalist Elita Veidemane invited by LTV to voice her opinion. This means that people whose opinions aren’t considered correct by those in power, are not invited. But if something goes against their carefully planned scenario, mouths are shut, telling everyone to move on to a different topic. But the good news is that Latvia in First Place is the second most popular party in Latvia.
When it comes to ZZS, their biggest problem is they turned their back to [Aivars] Lembergs. Support for this party was largely linked to Lembergs’ popularity, but because they have betrayed him by saying he is not allowed to attend faction and coalition meetings – basically nowhere – and they have to support “rainbow” values, voters will turn their backs on them. This is why their popularity is nose-diving, and this is just the beginning.
You mentioned in the context of US elections that the world is changing, and that Latvia needs to change as well. One of the stops is the growing role of social networks in keeping people informed. How would you change people’s perception of popular developments in Latvia and the world?
I have one example. None of our politicians were invited to attend Donald Trump’s inauguration, but some politicians from other EU countries were. Trump won’t work with everyone. None of our politicians were invited. If there is some major congress involving all countries – this is different. But bilateral meetings and negotiations about important topics like US-Latvian economic relations will not happen. Formally, of course, we will be able to travel to US and meet with officials of a certain level, but it will not be on the level of presidents. America has made it clear – they will not work with everyone. This is today’s reality.
I have received an invitation to travel to Washington. There will be a Prayer Breakfast, where people from all over the world come, and my wife and I have also been invited. I also have meetings with various senators, congressmen from the Republican Party and, as far as I know, no one else from Latvia will be present there. Our government was not invited. As soon as Trump won, many began to rush to delete their tweets and comments online, because they participated in Trump’s defamation campaign. That’s the sorosist clique we have.
What is your opinion of the Green Course? Just recently people around the world cheered “Hurrah! We’re going green.” But since then this excitement has soured.
I have a beautiful green garden, but I am categorically against the Green Course. Half of Latvia is clad in forests. We are one of the greenest countries in the world. Our industrial economy is not all that well-developed to think about lowering something. When the Soviet Union collapsed, VEF, Sarkanā zvaigzne, Sarkanais kvadrāts, Riga Electric Machine Building Plant shut down. We entered the EU with hardly any industry. Only a couple of factories were left. Now that we’ve started doing and developing some things here and there we are being told: no, you can’t do that, because we have to support greens. Once Latvia reaches the average European industrial level, we will have something to discuss. We are already green. This Green Course needs to end. I am categorically against it. We share the same path with Trump in this regard and I will always gladly support his policy. One of the first decrees he signed was to restore oil extraction, build new wells in Alaska, and much more. Today, this “Green Course” is like a mafia, where trillions are spent, in Latvia it is billions. I am sure that this money would be of better use in defence, or to build freeways so that there is normal traffic in Latvia. We shouldn’t follow the “green” and, like Briškens says, lower driving speed and punish people for every exceeded kilometre. This is completely absurd.
I want a green Latvia, not a “Green Course”.
I want us to use our nature, agriculture, forestry, etc. to the fullest. If we chop something down, we need to restore it later, but we cannot limit our country’s development in enforced obedience. If we compare ourselves and Germany, Latvia’s industry reaches only about 10% of Germany’s, but we are prepared to spend as much money on the “Green Course” as this country. I believe Trump’s new polity will change Europe’s policy as well, and an end will be put on the green community.
You served as Minister of Transport during Indulis Emsis’ and Aigars Kalvītis’ governments. What do you think we should do with Rail Baltica and airBaltic?
If I was Prime Minister, I would make a clear government decision and invite the Saeima to vote that the only way we can afford Rail Baltica is with money from Europe. Latvia is prepared to finance only 15% of its costs. If Europe does not support this, we have no money. We cannot pull money from other programmes, take it away from pensioners, children or push the country into debt. This year will pay more than half a billion to service our external debt of more than EUR 21 billion. Next year we will pay EUR 630 million. As I’ve already said, if Unity is allowed to remain in power for another ten years, our debt will reach EUR 50 billion, because they easily borrowed two or three billion every year, so basically we have a bankruptcy.
Latvia is dying out: 30 000 people die and only 12 000 are born. This is exactly why my opinion is that Rail Baltica, which started out as Europe’s project, should be built using European money. And let’s not mull over what we will tell Estonia. They have much higher budget revenue than we do. Estonia will manage. As for Lithuania, I don’t even have anything to day. I am angry with them even though in reality they did well. To them, Lithuania is in first place. Lithuanians took down the rail track that lead to Latvia, so that the oil from Mažeikiai doesn’t go to our ports. They defended their country’s interests and they already have narrow rail tracks. Lithuania doesn’t need Rail Baltica at all – it was forced on them. They already have a direct connection to Poland and have no need for a connection to Latvia and Estonia at all. So there is nothing to complain about – what will Lithuanians say? They’ll only be happy if we don’t mess with their business. Lithuania is becoming a transit country. They already have a developed port and developed infrastructure with narrow and wide rail tracks.
As for airBaltic, the principle is very simple. When I was Minister of Transport, I had accomplished an increase of passengers by 700%. We need as many direct connections and we need to invest in marketing to attract more tourists to Latvia. I am interested in seeing people arrive and stay in Riga. How many nights they spend in hotels, now much money they spend in stores, restaurants, entertainment venues, etc. airBaltic is a very important company, it is. But we are leasing our national airline to let Estonians and Lithuanians to fly with it. Even now tickets are cheaper not when flying to Riga, but from Riga to Estonia, Lithuania, Sweden and Finland. I would change this company’s policy to make it more efficient, work more towards attraction of tourists and basically make it into a company that stimulates Latvia’s economy and tourism.
We can see that half of restaurants and cafes in Old Riga have already shut down, and this is not just in winter – this is true for summer as well.
This indicates enormous stagnation, which needs to be resolved. My offer is this – offer free tickets to tourists when it’s not the season to make sure they stay in Riga for three nights. The estimate is simple – we purchase cheap tickets from airBaltic, Ryanair or some other company for EUR 50 and give them away for free. But in reality it’s not for free, because a passenger who arrives here will spend EUR 500 for a hotel, EUR 500 in stores and cafes, provide work to our people and thereby provide revenue through VAT, social taxes and PIT. If we give money to airBaltic and they don’t give it back – let them earn the money back.
Latvia is in a severe demographic pit. There are projections that Latvia’s population will have dropped to 1.3 million by 2070. How should we tackle this problem?
We need to support families. I believe one of the ways is doing this through purchase of a dwelling. Everyone who takes a mortgage loan should receive money from the state to cover the mortgage for every child born in the family. I have a plan to provide a large amount of money for every newborn, but I’ll tell you about it when I become Prime Minister.