President Gitanas Nauseda doubts the prospects for the current governing coalition to function in the future.
"If at this pace Mr. Žemaitaitis (Remigijus Žemaitaitis, leader of Nemunas Aušra - BNS) discredits, to be honest, not only himself, but also the entire state, even in the eyes of foreign partners and in the eyes of Ukraine itself, I do not see any prospects for a coalition with this composition to work in the future and I think we are talking about a fairly short period of time when changes will simply be inevitable, because everyone will realize that this is inevitable," the head of state said in an interview with Verslo Žiniomi.
He spoke as the insults of R. Žemaitaitis and the leader of the Democratic Union "For Lithuania", Saulius Skvernelis, continued.
Their latest clash occurred over Lithuania's planned higher defense spending. According to S. Skvernelis, R. Žemaitaitis is spreading disinformation in meetings with voters, talking about sources of defense funding and criticizing the president.
He believes that such statements are not in line with the coalition agreement and claimed that he is waiting for the major coalition partners - the Lithuanian Social Democratic Party (LSDP) - to convene a coalition council.
According to the head of state, the working perspective of the coalition formed by the Social Democrats, "democrats" and "austerities" is "quite vague".
The President compared R. Žemaitaitis to former pro-Russian presidential candidate Eduards Vaitkus.
"The worst thing is that Žemaitaitis is becoming a kind of Vaitkus. If before the elections he managed to somehow disguise himself, now he is increasingly shedding his mask and those who voted for Žemaitaitis got Vaitkus," said G. Nausėda.
"From the state's point of view, having an increasingly overtly pro-Russian policy is too great a luxury these days," the head of state added.
The President has previously called the inclusion of Nemunas Aušra in the coalition a mistake.
The author is Sniegė Balčiūnaitė
