The Sad Saga of the Strawberry Cake

Last fall's Case of the Mysterious Briefcase, which led to the resignation of the man who'd once been the world's first Green Prime Minister, Indulis Emsis, couldn't exhaust the Green Peasants' flair for black comedy, it seems. One of yesterday's headlines was MINISTER TO REIMBURSE STATE FOR STRAWBERRY CAKE.

The Minister in question is the Special Assignments Minister for Electronic Government Affairs, Ina Gudele. She didn't use the taxpayers' money to pay for her birthday gift, a hammock (a fact she's apparently proud of). She did use the taxpayers' money to rent the space in which her birthday party was held, buy the wine with which it was celebrated, and obtain the by now notorious strawberry cake.

The Green Peasants' leaders quickly gathered to insist that she retain her Cabinet post -- she's "responsible only morally," according to them. The cake, of course, is the symbolic tip of the iceberg our ship of state long ago struck -- as Laila Pakalniņa points out in her editorial, the PM was probably not thinking about the Green Peasants when he didn't ask for Ina Gudele's resignation... or at least not as much as he thought about his fellow party member Ainārs Šlesers of Latvia's First Party, who has mishandled far more funds than a cake costs but remains the Minister of Transport, presiding over some of the world's most expensive bad roads and a post office that is all but bankrupt. How can one take action on a cake when we are building what might end up being the world's most expensive bridge?

Meanwhile, people have started signing up for yet another referendum, a ballot initiative to raise the minimum pension to subsistence level. This type of populism is unworkable -- there isn't any money for such an increase (what with the cake budget...). The sentiments, however, are perfectly understandable, like those of one Anatols on the front page of Diena yesterday. His 107 LVL monthly pension is now 118 LVL (ca. 167 EUR). He says it's possible to survive as it was during the war, when everyone was starving and lice-ridden. Or as they did after the war, when his father promised him a kilogram of candy if he didn't join the Young Pioneers -- he never got the candy because there was no candy available. Or like in his childhood, when he got two hot potatoes and felt so very happy. But not now, and not here. Anatols went to every demonstration for Latvia's freedom, from the very first protests called by Helsinki-86. Anatols is tired of waiting.

Anatols no doubt knows that the salary of a Cabinet Minister in 2009 is to be 4512 LVL (ca. 6420 EUR) a month -- and still it is difficult for Ina Gudele to get her own strawberry cake.

Update: Gudele is resigning after all.

Borderlands (VI)

There is a fresh and bizarre footnote to the loss of the eastern civil parishes of Abrene. Latvia is embroiled in a stunning scandal once again -- the sale of perhaps a hundred passports to wealthy individuals, mostly Russian citizens seeking to take advantage of Latvia's EU and Schengen membership. The Baltic Times has a brief article on the subject here. This latest episode of corruption, which may well involve the highest levels of the Office of Citizenship and Migration Affairs, was a deal worth at least seven million euros.

In Diena, the filmmaker and pundit Laila Pakalniņa adds fascinating detail -- apparently, no apparatchik noticed that many a millionaire suddenly hailed from Abrene (according to the falsified data on these fictitious citizens). If they had, either the crime would have been discovered -- or the area we've now recognized as merely "magical" wouldn't have been handed to Russia so smoothly, what with its wealth (in reality, it was the poorest part of interbellum Latvia and is now an impoverished Russian backwater, Pytalovo).

But what can one expect in a country with so many prosperous corpses?

My previous post has links to all of my posts on border issues. The photograph of a 1930s Latvian passport is from the Office of Citizenship and Migration Affairs.

"Eat fascist death, flaming media pig!"

Ernests at Diena offers comment on the Government's reaction to the deliciously earthshaking speech by the US Ambassador to Latvia at the University today. The title of the cartoon is "Americans and other Sorosistas." The text: "We will not submit to foreign pressure, imperialist pig! Corruption is an inalienable part of our sovereign democracy!"

Another reaction -- the opposition party New Era is introducing a no confidence motion. Confidence on the part of most Latvians in this Government has long been below zero, and Ambassador Bailey's speech is a sign of just how bad things have gotten -- America rarely criticizes its staunch ally and these words are quite harsh, coming from a diplomat. (Okay, so the speech does contain a stellar example of American "self-criticism": "NOW, PLEASE KNOW, AND YOU ARE HEARING THIS FROM ME, AMERICANS ARE NOT PERFECT IN THESE AREAS AND WE KNOW THAT")...

The title of the post is from Firesign Theatre. Hat tip to Aleksei for the cartoon!