It is no longer a “New Unity” crisis, the situation is “pulling” towards a political crisis

A unique system counts votes

The company SOAAR, which helped in counting the votes of the Saeima, as well as other elections and referendums, has acquired zero celebrity status. This company has created a specific direction – the so-called technical vision: the characteristics of human vision are turned into algorithms, with the help of which various processes are automated, including counting ballot votes. But it is not this newly created system that has brought the company fame.

In a conversation with “Neatsarigo”, the co-owner of the programming company SOAAR, Renārs Kažulis, said: “2010. I learned that the Central Election Commission (CVK) is looking for a solution to optimize the counting of votes in polling stations. It was a complex manual process consisting of more than ten steps that took 20-22 hours. One such hour of work in all stations cost about 35,000 lats in total. The counting of votes in one Saeima election cost around 770,000 lats, i.e. around one million euros. Counting took place at night – it was hard work. These were preliminary results and were then reviewed by the CEC for a month. CVK wanted to optimize this process, make it more transparent and cheaper.

We came to CVK with a prototype solution. We distributed ballots to those present, everyone voted, we put the stack of ballots in the scanner, pressed the button, and in front of everyone’s eyes the votes were counted, including all pluses and minuses. As soon as everything is counted, the election protocols are automatically sent to Riga, CVK. CVK appreciated it: it was exactly what we were looking for, they said. Such a system significantly reduced costs.

The system we created was used for the first time in 2011 – when Zatler initiated a referendum, after which an emergency election was to be held. Usually, elections are prepared for 18 months, then they should have been prepared within two months. The counting of referendum votes cost about 80,000 euros, the counting of election votes – about 60,000 euros. Not a million. The next referendum was in 2012 – on language. It cost about 28,000 euros. We also “counted” all future elections.”

“Suddenly, Artis Kampars calls me…”

In the extraordinary parliamentary elections of 2011, “Vienotība” won 20 mandates, it was the third largest faction in the Saeima. Two months later, the “Unity” congress was held, where the party leader and leadership bodies were re-elected. The system “Balsis”, provided by the company SOAAR, was used to count votes both in the Saeima’s extraordinary elections and in the “Vienotības” congress.

“Vienotība” used the services of this company for holding internal elections for eight years. It cost more than 20 thousand in total. However, “Vienotība” – if we believe Renārs Kažulis – has not paid a single euro for it. It should be noted that during eight years, SOAAR provided 47 election procedures in 13 “Unity” events – eight general meetings and five congresses of the Riga branch.

In 2020, Kajulis got fed up with the situation with the unpaid money, and he refused to count the votes for “Vienotība”. He didn’t have to wait long: soon he started having problems with the law enforcement authorities: he is now embroiled in four criminal proceedings. One of them has already been handed over to the prosecutor’s office, because the investigators believe that the company SOAAR has caused 56,000 euros in damages to the state. In what way – it is not clear.

But – the deeper in the forest, the thicker the partisans. In the program “What’s happening in Latvia?” Renars Kažulis told something much more criminal: “There were many strange things. “Unity” behaved, I would say, like political racketeers. In the 2014 Saeima elections, on the night of the elections, Artis Kampars suddenly calls me, calls me out and says that it looks like our chairwoman Solvita Āboltiņa will not be elected. We need you to do to get her elected. I say do you understand what you are asking, you are asking to falsify the election results. I will never step on that path in my life. And I refused. [Kampars] said – then everything will be fine.”

Nobody really knows how “everything” is, besides, Kadžulis will hardly be able to prove that Kampar really said that – no one was present, although Kampar’s anxiety is quite understandable. Kadžulis claims that he has reported these texts to both KNAB and SAB, but no one was “interested”.

On the other hand, KNAB claims that so far the office has not received a single submission from businessman Renārs Kadžulis or any other person in connection with the possible falsification of the results of the 2014 Saeima elections.

The SAB also says the same, namely that the office has not received an official submission from Kadžulis regarding possible falsification of the results of the 2014 Saeima elections or attempts to do so. Such a submission has not been received from SOAAR, the company he represents either. SAB has not received a single anonymous submission on the specific topic.

Can’t quit by hand anymore

In fact, it is no longer just about the “New Unity” in this case. We are already talking about public administration and the country as such. Even if Kadžulis fantasizes about night talks with Kampara, there is a possibility that falsification of election results MAY HAPPEN. It is a discredit to the country. Of course, it is also possible that this scandal has been initiated to reduce the value of the “New Unity” before the European Parliament elections.

Political scientist Filips Rajevsky assesses the situation quite harshly: “It is no longer a crisis of “Unity”. This situation is already “pulling” towards a political, state crisis. While it was about envelope salaries and something else, we could talk about the fact that one political party – leading and influential – is upset. Let’s assume that the representatives of this party did not really influence anything, but it still occurred to me that something like that could be done, right?”

Basically, it is a problem at the level of the Constitution, Rajevsky believes. “It is written in the Constitution that the sovereign power of the Latvian state belongs to the people of Latvia, and elections are the mechanism for realizing this power. Even if this news about the demand to change the election results is false, in a situation where the ratings of the government and parliament are very low, it is a very good ground for discrediting the country. Resolving this situation is hyper important. Otherwise, the foundations of the country begin to disappear. If people start not believing in elections, then we will reach the level of Russia, where – as we know – election results are falsified. The constitutional foundations of the country are being undermined.”

Rajevsky thinks that in this case, you can’t just give up, saying that the businessman messed something up. “People from all walks of life, even those who are not interested in politics, know about this case and it worries them. That is why it is not a one-party crisis. If “Vienotība” claims that Kažulis is lying, no one will believe it.”

Rajevskis is convinced that the crisis has been around since November, since the beginning of Kariņš’s flight, and it creates favorable ground for the operations of external forces. “But I don’t think that this crisis is provoked by external forces. The people we are talking about are locals. Of course, those who push the popular narrative about “failed country Latvia” will do everything to start shaking our country’s order – precisely on the basis of these scandals. They will not be the beginning of the swing, they will only perpetuate the content of these scandals.”

“In my opinion, this is already a matter for the President,” Rajevsky believes, “because it is about national security. We have a National Security Council, where Edgars Rinkēvičs is the chairman. It is necessary to look for a cornerstone in which everyone trusts, and on his basis, trust in everything else must be restored. He trusts the President the most.”

The President has reacted to the “New Unity” scandal: Edgars Rinkēvičs has asked the Prosecutor General Juri Stukānas to conduct an investigation into possible interference in the 2014 Saeima elections.

Confidence will go down

Sworn lawyer Saulvedis Vārpiņš is surprised by something else: “KNAB surprises me in this case. I have seen it myself – in many cases KNAB immediately conducts searches and arrests, but now there is only some sort of departmental examination of the possible illegal use of the information technology system developed by SOAAR at the “Unity” party congresses. This is absurd, because the resorial examination is intended to dig down something, not to reveal it.”

Vārpiņš is skeptical that the latest “New Unity” scandal will be investigated and revealed: “I think the ruling coalition controls all law enforcement agencies, so what can be the result?” And yet what should the “New Unity” do now? “You shouldn’t imitate some kind of “internal investigation” – to let the law enforcement authorities work, which shouldn’t imitate their work either. Everything can be revealed only by initiating criminal proceedings. But it is silly that all this is happening in the current geopolitical situation, and all this could also be related to the goal – to weaken the power of the state and create instability in Latvia. If this case is not thoroughly investigated, if no conclusions are drawn, the public’s trust in the state power will go down.”

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