“When you put these two things together \u2013 the survey results and the growing support for the National Alliance and for me as a potential mayoral candidate \u2013 as well as residents\u2019 concerns about issues only we are raising, I feel not only the opportunity and the need, but also a responsibility to run in the election,” MP Sinica told a press conference at the Seimas on Monday.<\/p>\n
“I, Vytautas Sinica, by decision of the National Alliance Council, will be our party\u2019s candidate in the Vilnius mayoral election,” he announced.<\/p>\n
Sinica, the party\u2019s only lawmaker, added the party would field candidates in “around a dozen” municipalities but said no final decisions had been taken on specific candidates or lists.<\/p>\n
A poll by Spinter Tyrimai presented at the event showed current mayor Valdas Benkunskas leading preferred candidates with 30%, followed by Art\u016bras Zuokas on 15% and Sinica on 9%.<\/p>\n
The survey also found 50% of respondents see traffic as Vilnius\u2019 most urgent problem, while 37% cite the integration of foreigners and 35% mention heating costs.<\/p>\n
Several candidates have already declared their bids for the capital\u2019s mayoral race. The Liberal Movement is backing Simonas Gentvilas, while the Freedom Party has nominated current deputy mayor Vytautas Mitalas. <\/p>\n
Former Vilnius mayor Art\u016bras Zuokas is also running as an independent and plans to form a civic committee called “Vilnius gali”.<\/p>\n
Benkunskas has not yet said whether he will seek re-election. Local elections are due in spring 2027.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"“When you put these two things together \u2013 the survey results and the growing support for the National…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":113755,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[93],"tags":[171,170,450,54429],"class_list":["post-113754","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-vilnius","tag-lithuania","tag-vilnius","tag-vilnius-en","tag-vilnius-mayor"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@dk\/116793661584147066","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/113754","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=113754"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/113754\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/113755"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=113754"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=113754"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=113754"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}