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Few Saeima members serve or want to serve in Home Guard

BC, Riga, 06.12.2016.Print version
Few Saeima deputies are members of the Home Guard, although the Home Guard is one of the cornerstones of the Armed Forces and officials regularly remind the public about the important role of the Home Guard, newspaper Latvijas Avize writes today.

At the moment, only two MPs are members of the Home Guard - Vilnis Kirsis (Unity) and Veiko Spolitis (Unity). Kirsis, a member of the Home Guard Student Battalion, says that combining service in the Home Guard and work at Saeima is not hard at all: "That's just one weekend a month, plus a nine-day camp during the summer. And the system is quite flexible. If you cannot make it one time, that's not a tragedy, you can make up for it at some other time." Kirsis has observed that intensity and quality of training received by Home Guard members is improving, as is the quality of technical equipment of the Home Guards.


The newspaper spoke to several young and athletic Saeima members, asking what was keeping them from joining the Home Guard. Ivars Zarins (Harmony) said he did not have enough time as his work at Saeima was taking too much time. Janis Upenieks (Unity), a former Youth Guard and Scout Movement member, who once even considered joining the Special Tasks Unit, also said he did not have enough time at the moment. On the other hand, Viktors Valainis (Unity) said he was considering joining the Home Guard sometime in the future.


MP Edgars Putra (Greens/Farmers) said that, had he only have to work at Saeima, he might be able to combine his work with service in the Home Guard, but he was also the parliamentary secretary at the Finance Ministry, a very time-consuming job.


Ainars Latkovskis (Unity), chairman of Saeima Defense, Internal Affairs and Corruption Prevention Committee, explained that it would not be right for him, an official supervising the defense sector, to also be a member of the Home Guard. While Artuss Kaimins said he was a pacifist who did not like guns and arms at all.


Saeima member Rihards Kols (National Alliance), who six months ago was saying that he was "just about" to enlist in the Home Guard, told the newspaper now that he had not made much progress and had postponed joining the Home Guard for another year.

 






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