Lithuanian Hero Heads for Comeback at Polls

Lithuania’s independence hero, Vytautas Z. Landsbergis, looked set today to avenge a bitter defeat four years ago by former Communists as early results from parliamentary elections put his Homeland Union party out front.

With 48 of the 2,037 electoral districts counted, the Homeland Union had 26% percent of the vote, the Christian Democrats 17% and the Lithuanian Democratic Labor Party of ex-Communists 13%.

Sunday’s elections, the second Lithuania has held since it quit the former Soviet Union in 1991, were hit by voter apathy.

Turnout figures showed Lithuanians had failed to get excited about the elections. With two hours of voting to go, slightly more than 50% of the electorate had turned out.

Landsbergis was quick to blame voter apathy on four years of rule by the ex-Communists.

“It indicates disappointment with democratic institutions. . . . It is the bad result of a bad job,” he told Lithuanian television.

Sunday’s vote was the first round of the elections, with a runoff set for Nov. 10. The first round will decide 70 of the 141 parliamentary seats under a proportional system and the second round the rest under a majority vote.

The Homeland Union has said it will work with the Christian Democrats, who stress traditional values in this Roman Catholic country.

Landsbergis, a stocky and bespectacled former music professor, was the unlikely hero of Lithuania’s dramatic drive to leave the Soviet empire, but he was later rejected by voters as the country’s economy struggled.

Landsbergis and the Lithuanian people won many admirers when they stood up to Moscow.

But as the economy plunged into crisis and inflation soared, Landsbergis’ movement was beaten at the ballot box in 1992, and the ex-Communists were propelled back into power.