I still remember clearly the 2011 general election when the Perussuomalaiset (PS)* party saw the number of MPs surge to 39 from 5 previously. Some thought that the PS would implode as the Rural Party did in 1972.
It took over 13 years for the PS to suffer its worst election loss in the European parliamentary election, when it saw its support dive from 13.8% in 2019 with three MEPs to 7.6% to one MEP.
The shock of the MEP election result was written all over Riikka Purra’s and PS secretary Harri Vuorenpää’s faces. Source: Iltalehti.
Before the election and if opinion polls are to be believed, PS chairperson and Finance Minister Riikka Purra thought that the party would end up in third place with three MEPs.
The secret to the PS’ success would be its favorite scapegoat: migration. Purra and her party poured it on before the election by villifying migrants and supporting a Rwanda model to send asylum seekers to Africa.
Four days before the election, Interioir Minister Mari Rantanen and Riikka Purra hosted a talk about how migration means trouble for society. It was an opportunity to step up on the xenophobia gas pedal and spread the conspiracy theories like the great replacement.
Interioir Minister Mari Rantanen, copies Nigel Farage and depicts migrants as “swarms.” Source: Perusuomalainen
Two critical questions emerge after the MEP election:
– Was it a knock-out blow that will send the PS flying back to the minor single-digit political leagues?
– With growing dissent against Purra and her party’s austerity policies, will it force the party to split like in 2017?
If the political price that the PS will pay for its defeat on Sunday was a massive political blow, it’s clear that 2011-2014 was a lost decade when Finland flirted with racism and fascism.
Purra and the PS are – lightly speaking – between a rock and a hard place. Copying xenophobic soundbites from other European far-right parties and creating storms in teacups will not fly any longer.
In the meantime, I am watching PS’ political Stalingrad, when in 1943 the tide of the war in Russia shifted against Nazi Germany.
