Volt Estonia movement aims to become a new political party

A new left-centrist, pro-European political movement is being established in Estonia, ERR reported on Monday. The nonprofit association Volt Eesti was founded in Tartu in late August and aims to grow into a political party.

Volt Eesti is a member organisation of the pan-European movement Volt Europa. Its board member Artur Kaasik described the group’s political position as liberal, with a possibly slightly centre-left orientation in economic policy.

“There is currently a lack of a left-centrist, forward-looking party in Estonian politics, especially as Eesti 200 is disappearing and other parties have little to offer in terms of a vision for Europe,” Kaasik told ERR.

According to its statutes, Volt Eesti aims to support democratic participation, promote political integration across Europe and support progressive social and economic reforms.

Kaasik acknowledged that the movement would compete with the Social Democratic Party, but said Volt Eesti differed from the Social Democrats on some issues.

“Innovation is important in this respect. We do not believe that everything necessarily has to be free. Some basic needs should be guaranteed, but not everything can be free,” he said.

The association’s specific organisational goal is to increase its full membership to at least 500 people so it can establish and register an independent political party under Estonian law.

Asked how quickly the party could be formed, Kaasik said: “As early as possible, once we have the necessary number of people.”

Volt Eesti currently has around 50 members, according to Kaasik. He declined to name prominent members but acknowledged that former Estonian president Toomas Hendrik Ilves is among its supporters.

Volt Eesti also hopes to take part in the next parliamentary elections on March 7. “Let’s say we will do our best to make it happen, but we cannot promise here how likely it is that we will stand as candidates,” Kaasik said.

Kaasik said the organisation had no specific donor. He added that anyone wishing to support the association financially would soon have the opportunity to do so.

Under its statutes, Volt Eesti will operate as Volt Europa’s official national branch and is required to follow, promote and implement the European organisation’s values and goals.

Volt Europa says its difference from other political organisations operating in Europe is that, while those groups are based on cooperation between parties active in individual countries, Volt seeks to develop a common European political programme.

Alongside left-centrist economic goals, Volt advocates reforming the European Union and pursuing closer integration.

Volt Europa was founded in 2017 and is registered in Belgium. It currently operates in more than 30 European countries and has five members in the European Parliament, who belong to the Greens European Free Alliance group.

The name Volt, which is also used in all languages and denotes the unit of electrical potential, was chosen to symbolise bringing new energy to European politics.