The Eighth Seimas of Lithuania was a parliament (

Seimas The Seimas of the Republic of Lithuania ( lt, Lietuvos Respublikos Seimas), or simply the Seimas (), is the unicameral parliament of Lithuania. The Seimas constitutes the legislative branch of government in Lithuania, enacting laws and amendm ...

) elected in

Lithuania Lithuania (; lt, Lietuva ), officially the Republic of Lithuania ( lt, Lietuvos Respublika, links=no ), is a country in the Baltic region of Europe. It is one of three Baltic states and lies on the eastern shore of the Baltic Sea. Lithuania ...

Elections An election is a formal group decision-making process by which a population chooses an individual or multiple individuals to hold public office. Elections have been the usual mechanism by which modern representative democracy has opera ...

took place on 8 October 2000. The Seimas commenced its work on 19 October 2000 and served a four-year term, with the last session on 11 November 2004.

Elections

In the elections in 2000, 70 members of the parliament were elected on proportional party lists and 71 in single member constituencies. Elections took place on 8 October 2000. No run-off was held in single seat constituencies and the candidate with the most votes was declared a winner. Liberal Union became the largest party in the parliament after winning 34 seats, followed by 29 seats won by

New Union (Social Liberals) The New Union (Social Liberals) ( lt, Naujoji sąjunga (socialliberalai), NS) was a social-liberal political party in Lithuania. The NS was a member of the European Liberal Democrat and Reform Party (ELDR) and an observer of the Liberal Internati ...

. The Social-Democratic Coalition of

Algirdas Brazauskas Algirdas Mykolas Brazauskas (, 1932 – 2010) was the first President (fourth overall) of a newly re-independent post-Soviet Lithuania from 1993 to 1998 and Prime Minister from 2001 to 2006. He also served as head of the Communist Party of ...

won 51 seats, with the largest party in the coalition,

Democratic Labour Party of Lithuania Democratic Labour Party of Lithuania ( lt, Lietuvos demokratinė darbo partija, LDDP) was the renamed Communist Party of Lithuania. It was a political party in Lithuania in the 1990s, which claimed to be social-democratic. The youth organization ...

, winning 26. Two

Modern Christian-Democratic Union Modern Christian-Democratic Union, ( lt, Modernieji krikščionys demokratai) was a political party in Lithuania that existed between 1998 and 2003. In 2003 the party joined forces with the Liberal Union of Lithuania (''Lietuvos liberalų sąjung ...

candidates were elected in the proportional vote, having run on the lists of the

and the

Liberal Union of Lithuania The Liberal Union of Lithuania () was a liberal political party in Lithuania. History The party was founded on the 25th of November, 1990 on a basis of the Vilnius University Liberal Club. Its first leader was Vilnius University philosophy pro ...

Activities

Artūras Paulauskas Artūras Paulauskas (born 23 August 1953 in Vilnius) is a Lithuanian politician. He was the Speaker of Seimas, the parliament of Lithuania, from 2000 to 2006, and he served as Acting President of Lithuania from 6 April 2004 to 12 July 2004. Ea ...

was elected as the Speaker of the Eighth Seimas. After the impeachment of

Rolandas Paksas Rolandas Paksas (; born 10 June 1956) is a Lithuanian politician who was the sixth President of Lithuania from 2003 to 2004. He was previously Prime Minister of Lithuania in 1999 and again from 2000 to 2001, and he also served as Mayor of Vilniu ...

, Paulauskas acted as the

President of Lithuania The President of the Republic of Lithuania ( lt, Lietuvos Respublikos Prezidentas) is the head of state of Lithuania. The officeholder has been Gitanas Nausėda since 12 July 2019. Powers The president has somewhat more executive authority t ...

from 6 April 2004 until 12 July 2004.

Česlovas Juršėnas Česlovas Juršėnas (born 18 May 1938CV at Seimas website
) is a

acted as the Speaker of the Seimas during the time. The Eighth Seimas saw an initial ruling coalition of Liberals and New Union (Social Liberals), which lasted less than a year. By July 2001, New Union (Social Liberals) joined the Social Democratic Coalition, headed by

. Under the term of the Seimas, Lithuania joined the

European Union The European Union (EU) is a supranational union, supranational political union, political and economic union of Member state of the European Union, member states that are located primarily in Europe, Europe. The union has a total area of ...

and

NATO The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO, ; french: Organisation du traité de l'Atlantique nord, ), also called the North Atlantic Alliance, is an intergovernmental military alliance between 30 member states – 28 European and two N ...

. It continued privatizations of energy enterprises (e. g.

Lietuvos dujos AB Lietuvos Dujos was a natural gas company in Lithuania. It was established in 1961 as an integrated gas company for import, transmission, distribution and sale of natural gas. After privatization in the 1990s, its major shareholders became Gazpr ...

and Lietuvos energija). Also this Seimas oversaw the

impeachment Impeachment is the process by which a legislative body or other legally constituted tribunal initiates charges against a public official for misconduct. It may be understood as a unique process involving both political and legal elements. In ...

of President of Republic

Composition

Parliamentary groups

During the first session of the Seimas the following parliamentary groups were registered: Social Democratic Coalition, Liberals, New Union (Social Liberals), Homeland Union - Conservatives, Peasant and New Democracy Parties and the Mixed Group of Members of the Seimas. At the beginning of the session, a quota (7 members) for parliamentary group formation has been introduced. This change came after experience with previous Seimas, in which parliamentary group might have been as small as 2 members. Substantial shifts between parliamentary groups occurred during the term. In 2001, numerous members of the Liberals parliamentary group either joined Independent parliamentary group (in 2002 it renamed itself to the Liberal Democratic parliamentary group) or Homeland Union - Conservatives parliamentary group. In 2003, this parliamentary group was joined by the several members from Mixed Group and formed Liberal and Center parliamentary group. Similar process happened in New Union (Social Liberals) parliamentary group between 2002 and 2004, when numerous members moved to the Social Democratic Coalition or Liberal Democratic parliamentary group. By the end of the term of the Seimas, the following parliamentary groups were active.

Members

A total of 151 members served on the Eighth Seimas.

References

{{Seimas of Lithuania Legal history of Lithuania 2000 in Lithuania 08