Lithuanian Prime Minister Ingrida Šimonytė met with President Gitanas Nausėda on Wednesday and said after the meeting she would present candidates for education and social security ministers later this week.
The position of the minister for education, science and sports has been vacant since April when Gintautas Jakštas resigned. Meanwhile, Social Security and Labour Minister Monika Navickienė resigned last week because of her suspicious connections.
“I will present the candidates later this week,” the prime minister told reporters after the meeting with the president. “I hope to submit them by the end of the week, depending on when the president has the opportunity to meet the contenders.”
The prime minister did not disclose the names of the ministerial candidates.
“As soon as I sign the submission to the president, I will reveal them,” Šimonytė said.
Last week, the prime minister said that conservative MP Radvilė Morkūnaitė-Mikulėnienė, who leads the TS-LKD political group in the parliament, could become education minister.
The current government’s term ends this autumn with general elections scheduled for October.
‘Acceptable’
Lithuanian President Gitanas Nausėda says the candidates for ministers of education and social security he discussed with Prime Minister Šimonytė on Wednesday are acceptable “at this minute”.
“The candidates seem acceptable at this minute,” Nausėda told reporters, adding that he would meet the candidates next Tuesday. “If there are no problems, I will certainly not delay the process.”
According to Nausėda, the future education minister will not have the time to draw up new strategic visions, but will have to “clean the stables, if I may say so, in the education sector”.
“We don’t have the time even for that, but such a return to normalcy and reassurance of the education community is what is most needed at the moment,” the president said.
The president also believes work at the Ministry of Social Security and Labour has been quite smooth until Navickienė’s resignation.
“The [new] person should simply continue the work and prepare, of course, for the 2025 budget,” the president said.
Ministers in Lithuania are appointed by the president on the prime minister’s nomination.
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