Grybauskaitė told reporters Monday that fighting corruption in state institutions will be her main focus for the next year in office. Photo by Džoja Gunda Barysaitė/Office of the President of the Republic of Lithuania

VILNIUS — Dalia Grybauskaitė, Lithuania’s first female president marked her first year in office on Monday with polls showing she’s still the most popular politician in the country.

After winning the election by a landslide last spring with only a modest campaign effort, Grybauskaitė has made combating Lithuania’s so-called oligopolies, fighting corruption, revamping the country’s intelligence service and a more pragmatic foreign policy her top priorities.

Arriving in Vilnius’ Presidential Palace direct from her European Commissioner position in Brussels a year ago, at a press conference to mark the anniversary Grybauskaitė said she was surprised at how poorly the Lithuanian government’s structures were equipped to fight corruption and implement reform.

“It was facing a very high inertia of the state apparatus, legislative gaps, procedures, discussion inertia. This is somewhat hampered the work. I want to confess, I did not expect such criminality and corruption wave that met me [the first year]. And such fragmentation of the state agencies that are struggling with these phenomena. This is an unpleasant discovery,” Grybauskaitė told reporters.

Indeed, Grybauskaitė has highlighted overcoming corruption as the country’s principal challenge in her State of the Nation Address given last month and said that this will be her main focus for the next year in office.

“This year, society expects and demands more personal responsibility and high-quality approach to work in public service and law enforcement bodies,” Grybauskaitė told the press.

This article is free to view. To read Baltic Reports’ subscription-only articles, click here.