On 10 May 1919, a month after the 16 April coup in Liepāja, the pastor and writer Andrievs Niedra became head of the Latvian government supported by German military circles. A People’s Council Presidium document published by Historia.lv states that on that day Borkovskis’s cabinet resigned and handed power to Niedra’s cabinet; a Latvijas Vēstnesis chronology records it as Niedra’s rise to the head of government. This step split authority during the War of Independence and opened the dramatic road to the Battles of Cēsis.

In the spring of 1919, the Latvian state was still fighting for survival – against the Bolsheviks, against Baltic German political ambitions, and for international recognition. Niedra’s cabinet became one of the sharpest symbols of the internal power crisis during Latvia’s War of Independence.