Riikka Purra, the favorite to win the Perussuomalaiset (PS)* leadership at the party’s annual meeting over the weekend, said Wednesday at Yle’s A-Studio was one of the many steps she took wants to tighten citizenship laws.
This summer, the first vice president of the PS said that the party would not join any government that would not tighten “significantly” immigration policy.
The present chairperson of the party, Jussi Halla-aho made a surprise announcement in June that he would step down as party chairperson.
Even if Purra did not mention how she would tighten citizenship laws, members of the PS have spoken of raising the requirement for citizenship from five years to as much as ten years.
Purra also victimized as usual low-wage migrants and how family reunification laws should also be tightened further.
She claimed that Finland’s family reunification laws are not as tight as Sweden’s. Factcheck?
Some see these proposed changes in the immigration law and limiting social welfare to migrants and even Finns as the neo-conservative fact of the party.
Few will argue that if the PS is in government, it will severely undermine the rights of migrants, workers, and groups like single mothers.
Even if there is a lot of hostility and bravado, especially in Purra’s comments, it is clear that it will be difficult to recognize Finland if the next prime minister of Finland is from an Islamophobic party like the PS.
