Olekas to meet MP considering leaving Social Democrats

Seimas Speaker Juozas Olekas will meet with MP Laura Asadauskaitė-Zadneprovskienė, who has said she is considering leaving the Social Democratic Party, LRT reported. Olekas said he believed they would be able to continue working together.

“We will talk. It seems to me that we have our meeting today. I think we will continue communicating and working together in one way or another,” Olekas told Žinių radijas on Wednesday.

He said they had worked well together on issues related to the oversight of athletes, but that Asadauskaitė-Zadneprovskienė had a different view of how the sports sector should be managed.

As reported earlier by the Lrytas news portal, Asadauskaitė-Zadneprovskienė is considering leaving her current political colleagues. She said she planned to speak with Orinta Leiputė, chair of the Seimas Social Democratic Party parliamentary group, and Olekas before making a final decision.

“We will see how the dialogue develops. But in reality, you could say that I was fooled and deceived, and I call it a stab in the back. The wound is bleeding now,” she told Lrytas.

Asadauskaitė-Zadneprovskienė was replaced as chair of the Seimas Youth and Sports Affairs Commission by fellow Social Democrat Algimantas Radvila. Prime Minister Mindaugas Sinkevičius previously said the changes were prompted by criticism of the commission’s pace of work and stalled legislation related to sport. He said the commission had received remarks from the Ministry of Education, Science and Sport.