Was the prime minister lying?

Okay, I know I promised that I would continue with part two of the conscription debate next, but recent developments in Finnish politics are just something I have to write about.

While in Finland we read about American politics on pretty much a daily basis, Finnish politics on the other hand, are rarely talked about abroad. This is a great pity as last summer there was bit of drama when our government nearly fell, because of one the coalition partners elected new leadership. This led to prime minister Juha Sipilä to announce that he would deliver his letter of resignation to the president, but literally at the last minute something happened, which allowed his cabinet to stay intact.

Some backstory. In the 2015 parliamentary election, the Center Party won in a pretty spectacular fashion, which led to their leader Juha Sipilä to become prime minister. He then formed a governing coalition with the National Coalition and the Finns Party. The Finns Party had become one of the biggest parties only in the previous election in 2011 and this time, while losing one seat, they ended up becoming the second largest party. As a result, their leader Timo Soini, was expected to become the finance minister, as the spot has traditionally reserved for the leader of the second largest party in parliament. He however chose against this and became the foreign minister instead, a decision which angered some of the parties supporters. This was just the beginning. Even though being part of a governing coalition means you have to make compromises so the government can function, it seemed that the Finns Party was always the one to give in on their goals which led to some infighting. One of the biggest examples was Sebastian Tynkkynen, one of the parties high ranking members at the time and the then leader of the parties youth organizations, starting to collect a list of names, in order to hold a vote on whether or not stay in the government. Not surprisingly, the party began dropping in the polls and after a defeat in the 2017 municipal election, the fate of the current leadership was becoming clear.

In early June this year, the Finns Party held it's party convention, where they elected their new leadership. Timo Soini, who had been leading the party for the last 20 years without facing any serious competition, had announced earlier in the year that he would not be seeking another term. This led to two candidates having the best chances to win: Sampo Terho, who was pretty much considered the establishment candidate and Jussi Halla-aho, who was seen more as a hardliner in a party already known for it's tough stance on immigration and generally conservative outlook on social issues. Probably because of the recent failures of the former leadership, Halla-aho ended up winning in a pretty wide margin. Not only that, but his supporters pretty much hijacked the whole party leadership. Needless to say,  this was bit of a shock for the political landscape of Finland.

Before the convention, there had been three main ideas thrown around on what would happen if Halla-aho ended up winning the election.

1. The government would fall and new elections be held.

2. The government would fall, but the Center Party and National Coalition would stay in power by forming a new government, most likely, with the Swedish National Party and the Christian Democrats.

3. The Finns party would split as the Soini/Terho wing of the party would leave and form a new parliamentary group, so the government would continue as nothing happened.

Ultimately the third option came true, but the speed in which it happened raised suspicions about the rest of the government, and especially the prime minister, knowing about this in advance.

Here's the timeline. The convention was held from Friday 9th of June to Sunday 11th of June. Halla-aho was elected as the leader on Saturday. On Monday, Halla-aho met with prime minister Sipilä and finance minister and leader of the National Coalition  Petteri Orpo. Despite Halla-aho promising during the weekend that he would follow the program the government had agreed on, after a short meeting, both Sipilä and Orpo announced that it would not be possible to continue with the Finns Party in the government. Same day, prime minister Sipilä announced that he would be presenting his letter of resignation to president Sauli Niinistö. The next day, while on his way to meet president Niinistö at his summer residence in the town of Naantali, news broke that 20 members of the Finns Party had left the party and formed a new parliamentary group named New Alternative, which later was changed to Blue Reform and pledged support for Sipilä's government . This breakaway faction included all five of the parties ministers, including the former leader Timo Soini. During a press conference Soini gave a statement saying that the party he was once a member of, didn't exists anymore. Immediately after hearing the news, Sipilä held a press conference, saying that he would not resign and the government would keep running just as did before, with the same ministers.

As I said earlier, there were immediately accusations that both Sipilä and Orpo had actually known about the plan all along, even before the new faction broke away from the Finns Party. They both denied the accusation but recently there has been new evidence, suggesting that they in fact knew about this plan. This has been dubbed by the media as "Takakontti-gate", takakontti being the Finnish word for a cars trunk or boot, depending on where you live. The name comes from the reports that Samuli Virtanen an adviser to Timo Soini had met the prime minister at his residence on Sunday during the Finns Party convention weekend and that in order to avoid media attention, he left the residence in the trunk of a car. This has raised questions about what the two were talking about. It's currently suspected that Virtanen had presented the prime minister a list of names of who were potentially about to leave the party. There have also been reports that that the prime minister actually knew for certain about the plans on Monday evening, before he left to meet the president and that the whole journey to Naantali was just a distraction to make it seem that he had no idea about the plan. Sipilä has admitted to meeting Virtanen on that date but denied knowing anything about his interesting form of transportation. He also claimed he had mentioned about the meeting earlier to media, but couldn't recall when this was. And neither could the media. Prime minister Sipilä still denies knowing about the plan in advance, but has recently admitted that there were talks about taking breakaway members from the Finns Party in the government if it came to that. What's the truth? At the moment it doesn't look good for the government. I still doubt that this will actually lead to anything. Having been following this prime minister, it seems the man has no shame. 

Since the convention, the Finns Party has been climbing in the polls, however, they are still far away from their record numbers. I also doubt that they will ever reach those numbers again as Halla-aho is seen as bit of an extremists on some issues, especially immigration. Blue Reform, the breakaway faction currently has their support somewhere around 1%. They are currently trying to register the group as an actual party and has seen some of the local leadership from the Finns Party jumping ship. While their support is pretty low at the moment, there still is about a year and a half before the next election so things might still change. Probably the biggest effect this crisis will have is the Finns Party losing their spot as a major party. But, I guess we have to wait and see.