Finland Times

Negotiations to form a new coalition government of Finland are about to start, following the parliamentary election last Sunday. The Finns Party, which rose to the second biggest party in the election, seems likely to enter the coalition.

     The Center Party won 49 seats in the 200-seat parliament, and the Finns Party came second with 38 seats. The current ruling parties, the National Coalition Party (NCP) and the Social Democratic Party (SDP) got 37 and 34, respectively.

  Unto Hamalainen, a political reporter at the Finnish daily Helsingin Sanomat, estimated that Finland will probably see a government made up of three of the largest parties, to ensure the majority seats.

     In this case, the Center Party has to choose two partners out of the other three large parties -- the Finns Party, the SDP and the NCP.

     Sami Borg and Riikka Uosukainen, election experts at the Finnish national broadcaster Yle, believed that the Finns Party is very likely to be one of the Center's partners in the new government.

     It remains foggy whether the SDP or the NCP will join.

     Having experienced the arduous cooperation with the NCP in the last four years, the SDP chairman Antti Rinne has said his party is unlikely to work together with the NCP in the post-election government.

     Borg said in an interview with Yle that the result of the election, in particular, reinforced the position of the Finns Party.

     Founded in 1995, the Finns Party is a populist and nationalist political party in Finland. Timo Soini has been the party chair since 1997.

    

The Finns Party has gradually seized ground in the political arena since 1999. The popularity of the party has surged from 0.1 percent in 1999 to 19.1 percent in 2011.

     The most important reason behind the rise of the party can be attributed to the gloomy economic situation both in Finland and in the euro zone.

     During the euro crisis, the Finns Party expressed opposition to providing bailouts to the heavily indebted countries for several times.

     The Finns Party has been in opposition in the past four years, because of their strong disagreement with the ruling parties over the EU's support of Greece and Portugal.

     In the election last Sunday, the Finns Party won second most seats, and will have a big say in forming the new government, which came as a surprise for many, said Borg.

     However, the Finns Party has distinctive views apart from the Center and other parties on several issues, such as immigration policies, relations with the EU and Russia.

   Juha Sipilä the Chair of the Centre Party has emphasized that his party supports work-based immigration. Soini has also eagerly expressed that he wants Finland to be an open country to immigrants, despite his party's negative attitude towards the matter.

     Some specialists believed that Soini's claim was a sign of flexibility, but the party's immigration policy would not be subject to any big change.

     Regarding the EU, Sipilä has reaffirmed that Finland is a part of the union. Soini, on the contrary, expressed his mistrust of the EU, saying that the EU "is trying to be a European supper power at every level."

     The Finns Party chair has called on Finland to exit from the euro zone. However, he has also admitted it cannot happen without the support of a majority of Finns and the parliament.