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Reactions to Sunday’s Helsingin Sanomat editorial
The Social Democrat parliament member Jacob Söderman has said that yesterday’s Helsingin Sanomat (HS) editorial is a warning that things are going very wrong for Swedish-speakers’ rights.
HS wrote yesterday that Swedish-speaking Finns’ concerns over their diminishing rights were justified. See previous blog entry for more details.
Söderman named the Centre party as the biggest villain behind recent decisions that have effectively reduced the ability to receive services in Swedish. Municipalities / Local Government Minister Mari Kiviniemi (Centre) received particular criticism for her attempt to ignore the concerns of both Parliament’s Consitutional Committee and the Chancellor of Justice with regard to assigning bilingual Karleby (Kokkola) to the unilingual Oulu state administrative district instead of the strongly bilingual Vasa. Both the Constitutional Committee and Chancellor of Justice has ordered that Kiviniemi arrange a report that compares the two options with regard to the linguistic consequences of such a move. Kiviniemi has tried to instead order a report that would only investigate the linguistic provisions that Oulu would be capable of providing.
The Swedish People’s Party (SFP) parliament member Ulla-Maj Wideroos has claimed in the light of HS’ editorial that “it is obvious that there is a hidden agenda concerning the Swedish language. The Centre party’s next step will be to adjust the parliamentary electoral districts to ensure that the influence of Swedish-speaking Finns is reduced.”
Wideroos also claims that the National Coaltion party (Kokoomus) and the Social Democratic Party (SDP) bear some of the responsibility for the current language climate, “Centre receives the power that the other two main parties give them”.
Söderman (SDP) states that in his judgement the Centre party has closed its ears to the requirements of Swedish-speakers.
The chair of of the Swedish assembly of Finland, Folktinget, Anna-Maja Henriksson (SFP) also points to Centre, but also others, “Centre has displayed a spectacularly nonchalant attitude for Swedish in the matter of Karleby, but Kokoomus have also helped them. With regard to the police district reform, the minister responsible was from Kokoomus.”
Wideroos (SFP) regrets the fact that there are today so few, if any, strong advocates of bilingualism amongst Finnish-speaking politician. She mentions former prime minister Esko Aho (Centre), former prime minister and parliament speaker Paavo Lipponen (SDP), former president and Nobel peace prize winner Martti Ahtisaari (SDP) and former minister Olli-Pekka Heinonen (Kokoomus) as politicians previously active who understood the importance of bilingualism and acted to further it.
Wideroos welcomed the fact that HS has now acted in defence of bilingualism. “This is exactly what we need. Finally, the country’s largest newspaper has said precisely what we have thought for a long time. This is of great importance, this will certainly be read by prime minister Vanhanen (Centre), opposition leader Urpilainen (SDP) and finance minister and party leader Katainen (Kokoomus).
UPDATE 27/10
Prime Minister Matti Vanhanen (Centre) has denied that there is any reason for concern over Swedish-speakers’ rights. He told reporters from the Finnish News Agency FNB/STT that he had not had time to acquaint himself with the Helsingin Sanomat’s editorial but that “we are one people with two languages and both languages ought to be equal.”
“Ought” to be, Matti? Actually, I think you will find it is “must be”. Time to take out the law books and read the constitution.
For more on our prime minister’s difficulties in understanding reality, read this entry on the Jees Helsinki Jees blog: Vanhanen to Swedish-speaking minority: “Your grievance against the Finnish mainstream isn’t justified” « Jees Helsinki Jees
The municipalities of Pernå, Strömfors (Ruotsinpyhtää) and Lijendal will merge with the town of Lovisa from 1 January 2010. The new enlarged Lovisa will have a population of ca 15 700 and a Swedish-speaking population of 44% (39% in the current Lovisa town). The merger means the loss of the last Swedish-speaking majority municipalities east of Helsinki (or east of Ingå to be more precise, which is now Finland’s most “eastern” Swedish-speaking majority municipality) and the last Swedish-speaking majority municipalities in Östra Nyland (Itä-Uusimaa); both Pernå and Lijendal have a majority of Swedish-speakers.
Voters in the new Lovisa voted already on Sunday for their new municipal council which will replace the four existing separate bodies. The new council will assemble for the first time in November. Svenska folkpartiet, the Swedish People’s Party (SFP), won the most votes and seats. SFP won 40,6% of the vote and will thus get 25 places. The Social Democratic Party (SDP) won 22,8% of the vote and 14 seats. The National Coalition Party Kokoomus/Samlingspartiet got a vote share of 14,1% equating to 8 places.
The populist right-wing True Finns, the Greens and the Centre Party will each have 3 seats in the new council receiving 5,8%, 5,3% and 5,1% of the vote respectively. The Left Alliance becomes a new face in the politics of the municipalities winning its first seat with 2,3% of votes. The ‘Non-Alligned in the New Lovisa’ and the Christian Democrats also both pick up one seat each with 2,1% and 1,6% respectively.
The municipal election in the new Lovisa marked the first electoral outing for the Finnish Pirate Party (see previous entry on the PP). They failed to find any sympathy amongst voters getting just 17 votes (0,2%) and no seats – the only party that stood not to win a place.
The main story of the night was the extremely slow processing and announcing of the results, despite a turnout of only 62,3%. The final preliminary result was not announced until gone half past eleven, over three and half hours after voting booths closed. Borgåbladet reports that several voices at the National Coalition party’s election night called the organisation of the vote count “a scandal” and that action must follow as a result of its poor handling. The Lovisa-based newspaper Östra Nyland reports that the vote reporting was so scandalously slow because the Central Elections Committee in Lovisa had only arranged for one computer and one person to manage the reporting of the votes.
Although SFP won the most votes and seats, it does not have an overall majority. Some voices in the local Social Democratic group have said that they would like to see all the other parties form a coalition to keep SFP out from power in the new Lovisa. However, the SDP is split on this matter and the Kokoomus’ local leader has already announced his preferred alliance would be with SFP and the Greens. It also seems highly unlikely that non-SFP parties, which cover a large spectrum of political views, could come to an agreement to keep SFP out. So, SFP is likely to have the strongest hand in the coming negotiations over how to structure the running of the new Lovisa.
The election results can be seen as a disappointment for the SDP and Kokoomus in comparison with their expectations. It has been a marginal success for the True Finns who received more votes than Centre. SFP’s share of the vote is roughly as expected, if not a very slight disappointment. SFP may have lost some votes in Liljendal and Pernå to parties that have not previously contested municipal elections in those municipalities. In other words, some voters had more choice than in the past.
Pictured: Town Hall on Lovisa’s main square, built in 1862.
Finland’s highest circulation newspaper, the Finnish-language Helsingin Sanomat (HS), has published an editorial in which it states that the concerns of Swedish-speaking Finns over their rights are justified.
HS states in its leader that the last few years have seen an increasingly tougher climate for Swedish in Finland, primarily as a result of three reasons; an increase in hateful views on Swedish-speakers and Swedish in Finland on a number of internet-based discussion sites, a new generation of politicians who often no longer speak Swedish fluently and a view amongst many politicians that larger institutional units are as effective as small ones. The paper names Helsinki’s recent forced annexation of a significant part of western Sibbo (Sipoo), the decision to close down the maternity ward at Ekenäs hospital, the reform of court districts, the reform of the police’s administrative districts, the attempt to get bilingual Karleby (Kokkola) to join the unilingual Oulu state administrative district against its city council’s will, and the recent proposal for bilingual schools in Esbo (Espoo) as examples of recent policy decisions that cause harm to Swedish-speakers’ rights. The newspaper states that these decisions show that the right to receive services in one’s mother tongue has been relegated to secondary issue when decisions are made.
HS’ editorial states that Swedish-speaking Finns can be a part of the reason behind the change in attitude towards Swedish in FInland. The leader column states that “Swedish-speaking Finns have had a defensive attitude towards their linguistic rights. This has strengthened an understanding amongst Finnish-speakers that Swedish-speakers want to isolate themselves and are inflexible.”
However, HS goes on to state that is is hard for persons belonging to a linguistic majority (i.e. Finnish-speakers) to understand how things seem for a minority group that are constantly concerned about their cultural identity and rights.
Helsingin Sanomat states that is is time for decision-makers to take the rights of Swedish-speaking Finns seriously. The paper underlines that Swedish-speaking Finns are as Finnish as Finnish-speaking Finns and notes that the cultural roots of Swedish-speakers in Finland go back as far as the start of Finnish history.
Helsingin Sanomat’s leader is a welcome contribution and hopefully will provide a welcome call to Finnish-speaking decision makers and civil society who may not even have noticed how recent actions have effected the Swedish-speaking population. For Finland’s bilingualism to work, it needs champions in Finnish-speaking society and amongst Finnish-speaking politicians. We Swedish-speakers can not make it work on our own.
At the same time, the fact that the issue has become so clearly visible even on the radar of the leader pages of Finland’s most influential newspaper reveals just how serious the language climate is right now. We must hope that there are Finnish-speaking politicians, including those in the government, who have read this article today and have realised that constitutional rights must be upheld in order to ensure our law-based society continues to develop hand in hand with the values of fairness.
The Swedish People’s Party has, against the predictions of many opinion polls, won a seat in the European Parliament. Carl Haglund, 30 years old and the current State Secretary for Culture Minister Stefan Wallin (SFP), topped the SFP vote and will take the party’s seat.
SFP won 6,1% of the national vote with over 101 000 votes, an increase of around 6 800 votes compared to 2004, an election in which the turnout was higher. SFP took the 13th seat of Finland’s 13 seats and came close to taking the 12th, in what must be considered a very good result for the party. The standing between SFP’s candidates was also close. The party ran 20 candidates with no designated main candidate. For the first time, Åland’s main candidate stood on the SFP list – a factor that was very much of help to SFP. SFP won almost 90% of the almost 10 000 votes cast on Åland.
The other established parties performed badly. The three biggest parties, Kokoomus (National Coaltion), Centre and the Social Democrats all lost one seat. The Left Alliance has fallen out of the EU parliament, losing its one seat. The Greens did well, winning an extra seat to take them to two MEPs.
The populist right-wing True Finns party, in a voting league with the Christian Democrats, saw party leader Timo Soini win the most personal votes of any candidate, 130 432.
Election results in full can be found on Yle’s website: http://yle.fi/val/resultat/2009/eu/index.html.
Pictured, SFP chairman Stefan Wallin and newly elected MEP Carl ‘Calle’ Haglund.
Finnish time (GMT plus 3)
20.00 Finland’s polling stations close. Results of votes from advanced voting announced. SFP predicted to lose its European parliament seat. Kokoomus, Centre party and SDP all to win 3 seats. That’s minus 1 for Kok and Centre.
20.04 Important to note that Swedish-speaking Finns and SFP voters in particular often leave voting until the actual election day.
20.28 11 of the 20 most active turnouts in Finland in Åland municipalities. Britt Lundberg effect?
20.30 Lundberg from Åland currently in 4th place amongst top SFP candidates.
20.31 40,9% of votes counted. Ca 54 000 votes for True Finns leader Timo Soini. Currently the most personal votes.
20.33 Leading SFP candidate is in 16th place currently (of 13 Finnish EU parliament seats), it is Björn Månsson.
20.39 SFP just now looks like it could hold a seat, Björn Månsson has moved up to 13 place. 44,2% votes counted.
20.40 Finlands Svenska Televisions hockey commentator Kaj Kunnas is charged with delivering the vote results in FST’s election results programme. Beginning to think that he should perhaps stick to sport!
20.47 Outgoing SFP-European parliament member Henrik Lax being interviewed on FST. Repeats that it is vital that Finland is seen and heard in both languages in Brussels. A good example in a Europe full of language minorities, but where few have the same level of rights as in Finland. Vital that Swedish-speakers in Finland can turn to someone in Brussels without the risk of being misunderstood.
20.48 Possibility that Left Alliance fall out of the European parliament. SFP overtake them at 46% of vote counted.
20.51 Soini (True Finns), Jääteenmäki (Centre, former PM), Mitro (SDP, orthodox priest), Itälä (Kokoomus, national coaltion party, former party leader) top 4 candidates in personal votes currently. Månsson and Haglund in 27 and 28 place.
20.55 Risto Penttilä of True Finns interviewed on FST in one of this year’s most pointless interviews, as he can barely string a sentence together in Swedish. Calls SFP a racist party.
20.57 SFP currently up 1,1% on the result from the last EU election in 2004 with 6,8%. 55% of votes counted.
21.02 Carl Haglund has passed Björn Månsson. 111 votes between them. With things just now, Haglund would be SFP’s representative in the EU parliament.
21.03 Social Democrats and especially Left Alliance both significantly back. Interesting in times of economic problems. All established parties backwards with exception with SFP. True Finns taken many votes off established parties. Christian Democrats also forward.
21.06 Stefan Wallin, chairman of SFP, being interviewed on SFP. Still cautious. Will see final results. Björn Månsson also interviewed. Stresses an SFP mandate is more important than who take its.
21.08 Many votes in Korsholm, Borgå, Sibbo, Raseborg not yet counted. Could possibly favour Månsson. Stefan Wallin would be surprised if SFP stayed on 6,8%. Expects figure to shrink during the night as more Finnish-speaking areas report their results. Wallin notes that if SFP wins a mandate, it will be a very very good result with regard to fact Finland has one less MEP seat and that last time SFP was in a voting alliance (this time it is alone).
21.09 Nils Torvalds and Bo Linde also close behind Haglund and Månsson in personal votes on SFP’s list.
21.10 Yle says SFP likely to take 12th mandate, which would be an excellent result.
21.15 Interview with Christian Democrats on FST. Chairman of Swedish-speaking district of Christian Democrats admits it was very difficult to explain to Swedish-speakers the Christian Democrat’s election alliance with the True Finns. The party chairman Päivi Räisänen explains it is just a technical alliance when asked what the two parties have in common.
21.18 Nils Torvalds has overtaken Björn Månsson in the SFP’s candidates popularity.
21.19 Swedish-speaking and bilingual municipalities amongst the municipalities with the highest turnouts. Almost all over 50%. National figure only barely 40%.
21.22 73% of total votes counted in Finland – current status: Kokoomus 3 seats, Centre 3 seats, SDP 3 seats, Greens 1 seat, True Finns 1 seat, SFP Swedish People’s Party 1 seat, Left Alliance 1 seat, Christian Democrats 1 seat.
21.28 Thirteenth and last seat would currently go to Annika Lapintie of Left Alliance who is from a bilingual home. Possibility of two Swedish-speaking Finns in European Parliament.
21.36 SDP could lose one seat and be down to 2 MEPs. 80,2% of total votes counted. All three major parties losing one seat just now.
21.39 Yle says seats 12-16 are still uncertain as so many votes are uncounted in especially Helsinki. SFP’s position is still not secure.
22.00 FST: Alexander Stubb (kok), foreign minister and candidate in the last election, says it is possible that some of his previous Swedish-speaking voters turned to SFP in this election. SFP chairman Stefan Wallin, alongside him, says that one must also note that Bjarne Kallis (Christian Democrat, former party leader) is also not standing this time. Another possible source of Swedish votes.
22.05 Voting in neighbouring Sweden has ended (at 21.00 Stockholm time). Sveriges Television predicts that the Pirate Party will win 7,4% of votes in Sweden’s election to the EU parliament.
22.06 Yle reports that Left Alliance will fall out of EU parliament and that instead the Greens will take a second seat in EU parliament. Greens strong in Helsinki, where there are still significant votes to be counted.
22.08 Timo Soini received 24 votes on Åland! Åland Centre party candidate Britt Lundberg, representing all of the non-socialist Åland parties and standing on SFP’s list, received 7690 of the 9960 votes on Åland. (Hufvudstadsbladet)
22.10 So close between candidates at back of list that it is possible a second count will be required to get the actual result.
22.17 Likely that SFP will fall to 13th place and take the last Finnish seat in the EU election. Greens will overtake the 12th. SFP’s position still not secure according to Yle, if SDP or Left Alliance has many votes amongst those uncounted in Helsinki.
22.22 SFP near to receiving 100 000 votes. An increase of nearly 5000 votes on the previous election despite a lower voting turnout. 97,7% votes counted in the whole country.
22.25 SDP chair Jutta Urpilainen says she is disappointed with the election result. SDP had a goal of keeping 3 seats, and are losing ones.
22.27 Carl Haglund being interviewed on telephone on FST. Cautious, will wait for full result before he comments result.
22.29 FST showing loud, party scenes at SFP Swedish People’s Party’s election results party. Crowd shouting ‘Calle, Calle’ Calle’. Carl ‘Calle’ Haglund has not yet arrived.
22.31 99,1% votes counted. On FST, Stefan Wallin says it feels good. Party secretary Ulla Achrén (SFP) thanks voters.
22.33 99,5% Haglund as good as certain to take 13th of Finland’s 13 MEP seats.
22.37 99,7% of votes counted. What seems to be the final result. Elected members to the European parliament (from Yle):
| 1. | Ville Itälä | Saml. | 65 830 | 384 826,000 | Åbo | vald | 65 439 |
| 2. | Anneli Jäätteenmäki | C | 79 931 | 316 337,000 | Helsingfors | vald | 149 646 |
| 3. | Mitro Repo | SDP | 71 419 | 290 838,000 | Helsingfors | vald | - |
| 4. | Timo Soini | Sannf. | 130 205 | 231 661,000 | Esbo | vald | - |
| 5. | Heidi Hautala | Gröna | 58 652 | 205 448,000 | Helsingfors | vald | - |
| 6. | Sirpa Pietikäinen | Saml. | 51 372 | 192 413,000 | Tavastehus | vald | 30 042 |
| 7. | Hannu Takkula | C | 39 288 | 158 168,500 | Rovaniemi | vald | 32 739 |
| 8. | Liisa Jaakonsaari | SDP | 45 258 | 145 419,000 | Uleåborg | vald | - |
| 9. | Eija-Riitta Korhola | Saml. | 51 086 | 128 275,333 | Helsingfors | vald | 35 285 |
| 10. | Sari Essayah | KD | 53 616 | 115 830,500 | Pemar | vald | - |
| 11. | Riikka Manner | C | 37 294 | 105 445,667 | Varkaus | vald | - |
| 12. | Satu Hassi | Gröna | 56 769 | 102 724,000 | Tammerfors | vald | 74 714 |
| 13. | Carl Haglund | SFP | 16 780 | 101 169,000 | Esbo | vald | - |
Overall, so far, Swedish People’s Party took 6,1% of the vote, receiving 101 203 votes. 40,3% of the electorate turned out.
22.43 That’s the end of this live blog from the results of the Finnish election to the EU parliament, in which a Swedish-speaking mandate was preserved. Carl Haglund will respresent the Swedish People’s Party SFP in Brussels during the next EU parliamentary period.
Image: YLE FST5 Election results programme. SFP candidate Björn Månsson being interviewed.
Elections to the EU parliament are underway with polling stations in Finland open until 20.00 this evening. The official result, however, will not be known until 22.00, as according to regulations, member states must wait until all polling accross the EU is over.
It remains to be seen as to whether SFP, the Swedish People’s Party, will manage to hang on to a seat in Brussels. Finland’s total number of MEPs has fallen one from 14 to 13, making it a tighter race. Opinion polls in the run up to election day gave mixed readings. However, opinion polls do generally underestimate SFP support as they most often conducted only in Finnish. Additionally, Swedish-speaking Finns tend to be more active voters in the real election, something that is not taken into account in opinion polls. In SFP’s favour in this EU election is that for the first time the most popular candidate on Åland (Britt Lundberg, a member of Åland’s Centre Party) is standing on SFP’s list. The votes of the Ålanders could be the critical factor in returning an SFP MEP. Another factor in SFP’s favour is that foreign minister Alexander Stubb (Kokoomus, National Coaltion party) was a candidate in the last EU election – it’s likely he won considerable numbers of Swedish-speakers’ votes, especially in the Helsinki area. They will now be looking for someone else to vote for. Should SFP succeed, it seems likely to be Carl Haglund (state secretary for Stefan Wallin) or Björn Månsson (until recently leader writer at Hufvudstadsbladet) who will take the seat. One thing is for sure, the only way to ensure one’s vote goes towards electing a Swedish-speaker is to vote for SFP.
Another interesting result will be to see how well Timo Soini and his True Finns do. It is not unthinkable that Soini could win the most personal votes in the country. This must be of considerable embarrasment to supporters of the Christian Democrats who are in a voting alliance for this election with the True Finns. Christian Democrat voters may well have stayed home in the realisation that a vote for a Christian Democrat will help the borderline racist True Finns. A somewhat unholy alliance.
Pictured: SFP’s EU parliament candidates
Svenska Yle is reporting that the four government parties (Centre, National Coalition, SFP and the Greens) have agreed to propose introducing a law that would make it necessary for political parties to win at least 3% of the vote in a parliamentary election in order to gain representation. Originally, a 3,5% minimum was proposed. SFP had strongly opposed this.
This move is a backwards step for democracy. Had it existed at the time, it is unlikely that smaller, more recent arrivals to parliament, such as the Greens and the True Finns would have made it in to the parliament. Regardless what one thinks of the True Finns, this would have been anti-democratic. It is particularly surprising perhaps that the Greens, now in government, support this regulation.
What this 3% minimum will do is to make it much harder for small parties to get a foothold in parliament in the future. Thus the 3% barrier will consolidate the positions of the exisiting parliamentary parties. It will particularly favour the largest parties; Centre, National Coalition and SDP. They may see their support increase, as people considering voting for a party that is predicted in opinion polls to only just make it over 3% may see voting for that party as dangerous for their vote, if it is to count. Instead, they might just give their vote to a bigger party, sure of getting over 3% instead. If introduced, this 3% barrier will lead to more wasted votes. Hardly democratic.
SFP Party Conference 2009 in Helsingfors
The Swedish People’s Party (SFP) held its party conference at Arcada in Helsingfors this weekend.
The issues that have been most picked up in the media can all be said to be encompassed as equality related:
- Leader Stefan Wallin condemned the True Finns fishing for votes in the undercurrent of racist attitudes its campaign for the EU parliamentary elections in June. SFP can be said to have one of the least hostile policies on immigration of the Finnish political parties.
- SFP voted to propose that women also be included in military service, to a far greater degree than today.
- Most controversially, SFP voted to support adoption rights for same-sex couples (of any children put up for adoption, not just the children on one of the partners as Finnish law has just been changed to allow). The party voted 108-83 in favour of this motion.
Whilst SFP’s position on all of these issues can be said to be steps in the right direction for equality and liberal thought, the pragmatist can put them into question by wondering to what degree they go along with what should be the party’s key aim: the winning of votes. After all, if SFP does not ensure support at elections, it won’t be in a position to speak out for liberal values to any extent at all. SFP must be careful not to forget its principal raison d’etre: the defence and safeguarding of the position of the Swedish-language in Finnish society. To be able to do this, it needs to unite the Swedish speaking electorate. They also form the party’s core voting bloc; risking alienating or splitting them is dangerous for the party’s future. Yet, some of these decisions, perhaps especially that on same-sex adoption risk just that. There is a serious risk that this decision will alienate a not insignificant core of conservative SFP supporters, particularly in Österbotten, an area where so-called ‘traditional’ religious values are still strong. Whilst I, and many in the liberal wing may support these recent policy decisions, they may run the risk of undermining the more important task of the party, safeguarding Swedish. Certainly, SFP may pick up extra votes from the other language group, for instance from Finnish-speakers appalled at the racism of the True Finns and seeing SFP as the only party to truly condemn them. But will these be enough to replace those votes lost from the party’s key electorate? I doubt it. And even if they are, they are unlikely to come from people who give as much importance to the protection of Swedish.
Time will tell. But I fear that in the current political climate, where Swedish is under threat more than at any point in the last twenty years, SFP can not afford to alienate its core supporters. It is time for the party to unite and concentrate on its key mission. I hope that’s the conclusion that this autumn’s special extraordinary conference will come to. It was announced this weekend as being a chance for SFP’s grassroots to involve themselves to an unprecedented degree in the party’s policy-making. A chance to shape the direction of the party for the next few years.
The twist over whether the town of Karleby (Kokkola) will align itself with Uleåborg (Oulu) and Lappland as part of the future regional administration reforms continues. The Centre party dominated provincial council of Mellersta Österbotten (Central Österbotten), of which Karleby is the biggest municipality, has voted to align the entire province northwards. The majority of politicians in the town of Karleby itself (although not Centre) are of the opinion that Karleby should be a part of the Vasa region. This issue is of particular importance to Swedish-speakers in Karleby who would have little chance of obtaining high quality services in Swedish from an administration based in the unilingual Finnish-speaking north.
The Centre Party’s dogged insistence that Karleby’s future lies northwards again shows their complete disinterest (and even hostility) towards safeguarding the legal rights of Swedish-speaking Finns. It again shows their lack of respect for municipal democracy, as we’ve seen before in the case of strongly bilingual Sibbo (where Centre supported the annexation of a significant portion of that municipality by Helsinki against the Sibbo residents’ wishes). Now it seems that Centre cares so little for the interests of Swedish-speaking Finns, even their own party’s Swedish-speaking district has appealed to ministers of rival parties to ensure that when the cabinet take their decision on Karleby’s future, they choose the southern option. According to a report on Radio Vega, the Swedish-speaking Centre district has appealed to the National Coalition party (Kokoomus) minister Jyri Häkämies (who sits on the ministerial working group that handles regional administration matters) side-stepping their own Centre minister Mari Kiviniemi who is the actual lead on this issue as Municipality and Regions minister. Quite extraordinary.
With this in mind, one has to ask what the point of a Swedish-speaking Centre district if it can’t achieve even influence within its own mother party. This seems to prove the thesis that it has only been set up in order to try and win votes for the Centre party from a new sector of the population, rather than to actually represent Swedish-speaking Finns in politics. One must wonder when the Swedish-speaking district’s chairman, the controversial Peter Albäck, will realise this; that he and his district’s members are being used by the Centre party.
The ministerial working group handling Mellersta Österbotten and Karleby’s future, and that of around 13 000 Swedish-speaking Finns in the region, will meet tomorrow.
Today is the voting day for municipal elections. Polls are open until 20.00. If you haven’t voted in advance, this is your chance to have your say – but you’ll need to do it at the specific voting station named on your voting card. Results will come out from 20.00. It will be interesting to see if the Centre party’s performance will be poor. The Social Democrats are also going to their first election since their new leader Jutta Urpilainen took office in the summer; what reaction will the party-base make if, as tipped, they also perform badly? According to opinion polls, it’s the National Coalition Kokoomus party who should be looking forward to making the best progress.
In Swedish-speaking Finland, will the Swedish Peoples’ Party SFP manage to hold its ground; in the south, it’s faced with the challenge of demographics: as more Finnish speakers arrive, the proportion of Swedish speakers (and thus likely SFP voters) falls. How will they do in the newly merged municipalities, such as Svenskfinland’s soon to be largest town Raseborg which for the first time will go to the polls united in preparation for the 1 January merger. Will the new Swedish-speaking district of the Centre party led by the highly controversial Peter Albäck succeed in gaining ground anywhere outside his own home municipality of Kronoby? And, will the right-wing populist anti-Swedish True Finns party perform well enough to end up with a higher share of the national vote than the SFP and thus risk taking the only Swedish-speaking seat on the board of the National Association of Municipalities?
More analysis to follow after the results are known!
And, yes, Svenskfinland in English is back in business after a quiet patch (due to generally high work levels and also a 2 week holiday in the sun). Apologies if you’ve e-mailed lately and I haven’t got back to you – I shall do so soon.
Image: Ministry of Justice. Election results for all municipalities will be published as they come in on the Justice Ministry’s elections website.
