Lithuania’s Nauseda, Simonyte set for presidential election runoff

By Leila Nezirevic

LONDON (AA) – Incumbent Lithuanian President Gitananas Nauseda and Prime Minister Ingrida Simonyte will face each other in the second round of the presidential election on May 26, after the former failed to win an overall majority in the first round on Sunday.

With almost all votes counted, Nauseda, a moderate conservative and staunch supporter of Ukraine, received just over 44% of the vote in the first round of voting, while Simonyte got the support of nearly 20%.

“Yes, I wanted to win in the first round, but apparently we’ll have the runoff. I am ready to make a strong push for victory in the runoff and I think I will succeed in doing so,” Nauseda told national broadcaster LRT.

“My key goal was probably to make it to the runoff and I think I have achieved it,” Simonyte was quoted as saying by the broadcaster.

Simonyte, a former finance minister, lost the 2019 presidential election to Nauseda, but she became the country’s prime minister in 2020.

Nauseda suggested that Lithuania has achieved a lot in the last 20 years and is moving toward Western standards of living, according to LRT.

Security concerns dominated presidential election votes, with all of the major candidates agreeing that the Baltic country should increase spending on defense.

Eight candidates for the presidency pushed similar narratives throughout their campaigns, claiming that Lithuania and other Baltic states could be Moscow's next targets.

According to the International Foundation for Electoral Systems, the country's population is more than 2.8 million, with nearly 2.5 registered voters and an average turnout of 49.82% in the 2019 presidential election.

Polls closed at 8 p.m. (17:00 GMT) on Sunday, and the initial voter turnout was 60%, higher than in the previous election in 2019, according to the broadcaster.

The Lithuanian president's primary responsibilities include overseeing foreign and security policies and serving as supreme commander of the armed forces.

Apart from electing a president to lead the country for the next five years, the Baltic country also held a referendum on whether people can have multiple nationalities.

However, a second attempt to amend the constitution’s Article 12 and allow more Lithuanians to hold multiple citizenships has not succeeded after Sunday’s referendum.

Lithuania is located on NATO’s eastern flank, which according to many observers is particularly relevant as tensions rise between Russia and the West.