Ludmila Latt elected new leader of Centre Party faction in Kohtla-Järve council
The opposition Centre Party faction on Kohtla-Järve's city council elected Ludmila Latt as its new chairwoman on Monday, replacing Sergei Lopin, who quit the post.
On Monday, August 24, the Kohtla-Järve branch of the Centre Party announced that Ludmila Latt had been elected chairwoman of the party's faction in the city council. Six council members remain in the faction: besides Latt, they are Valeri Korb, Sergei Buchinsky, Raisa Bazhenova, Yevgenia Dvornik and Svetlana Korotkova.
From December 2025 to June 2026, Latt served as deputy mayor for education and culture in the previous city government. In May, she was also elected head of the Kohtla-Järve Centre Party branch, defeating the branch's former leader, Lopin, for the post.
Eight council members have left the faction
It was previously reported that five council members left the Centre Party faction under Lopin's leadership. In a statement, the Kohtla-Järve centrists said Lopin's decision to leave the faction was unexpected and came without prior discussion or an attempt to find a solution, adding that the current crisis largely resulted from Lopin's own political decisions and unauthorized negotiations with opponents.
In the 2025 local elections, the Centre Party won a decisive victory in Kohtla-Järve, taking 14 of 25 council seats, but eight members have since left the faction over the summer.
Negotiations on forming a new coalition are continuing in the city, and it may now also draw on the council members who left the Centre Party faction. According to the newspaper Põhjarannik, the coalition agreement dubbed "Restart" is expected to be signed on August 31 by most non-affiliated council members, while members of the Koos and Centre Party factions will not join.
In late June, the city council removed Centre Party-affiliated mayor Max Kaur, electing Evelin Danilov in his place. She formed a new city government with Restart representatives as deputy mayors. Despite the change in power, centrists Sergei Lopin and Ivetta Sakkart remain council chair and deputy chair, respectively. Currently, ten of the council's 25 members are unaffiliated with any faction.
