Category: Enrique Tessieri

The political record and chicanery of the PS of Finland is what has estranged so many voters from politics

Posted on by Migrant Tales

While some are still scratching their heads about the Perussuomalaiset (PS)* joining the European parliament’s European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR) group this week, it shows why so many voters have become estranged from politics. 

Näyttökuva 2014-6-5 kello 1.16.38

Read full story here. 

 

Before the historic 2011 parliamentary elections for the PS, when 39 of its MPs got elected from 5MPs previously, the party had a solid anti-EU, anti-immigration, homophobic and especially anti-Islam message.

It’s party leader, Timo Soini, watered down the PS’ stand on Europe recently by stating that he’s now against Finland leaving the EU. While its anti-immigration and anti-Islam rhetoric are still strong and lurking in the sidelines patiently waiting to stir voter emotions, its most outspoken enemies these days are homosexuals and gay marriage.

Hoping to become the biggest party in Finland after next year’s parliamentary elections, the PS has, however, tried to give a more moderate and mainstream image of itself. This is understandable considering that it wants to be a member of the next government and the disappointing showing of the party in the presidential, municipal and euro elections.

In all three elections, the PS hasn’t come even close to its 19.1% showing of 2011.

But after criticizing and riding the wave of voter discontent and mistrust of mainstream parties, the PS is trying to look more like them. Is this a good matter or is it another trick by the party to lure voters?

While at Migrant Tales we have spoken out repeatedly against the PS’ racism, provincialism and nativist nationalism, what is happening inside the party resembles the pigs in George Orwell’s Animal Farm.

The last paragraph of Orwell’s book says it all with respect to the revolution at Manor Farm and what the PS did in 2011: 

Twelve voices were shouting in anger, and they were all alike. No question, now, what had happened to the faces of the pigs. The creatures outside looked from pig to man, and from man to pig, and from pig to man again; but already it was impossible to say which was which.

Green Party politician Ozan Yanar asks a very valid question on his Facebook page. He states with evident dismay that here’s the “labor party without socialism” that has joined David Cameron’s conservatives in the European parliament. The absurdity of the situation is further highlighted by the fact that AKP, the political moderate voice of Islam in Turkey, joined the ECR [through the Alliance of European Conservatives and Reformists], according to him.

Moreover, the ECR is in favor of Turkey’s membership in the EU. PS MEP Jussi Halla-aho, who has declared war on Islam in the same way as the worst Islamophobes in Europe, is now a member of a political group that approves Turkey’s membership in the EU. 

In anyone’s book a criminal record isn’t a good matter to have in your records. Even so, and in the conservative spirit, where social and economic inequality are acceptable because people aren’t equal, the membership of the PS and Danish People’s Party in the ECR proves that it’s politically worse getting arrested for shoplifting than ethnic agitation.

UK Prime Minister Cameron, the leader of the ECR, isn’t too bothered by racism and prejudice since it was his government that launched the “Go Home” campaign against undocumented immigrants and spread fear to Britons that the country will be overrun by swarms of Romanians and Bulgarians on January 1.

Cameron has been playing political catchup with dismal luck against his rival Nigel Farage of the UKIP. If the UK prime minister would have taken the time to see what happened in Finland when mainstream political parties started to flirt with the anti-immigration message of the PS before the 2011 elections, he would have learned an important lesson: Don’t try to compete against xenophobic parties because you give legitimacy to them.

While the PS’ leader Timo Soini wants to show that his party is “normal” and “mainstream” these days, we should never forget what the party said and did to get where it is today.

In that message and in their actions is concentrated the poison that has estranged so many Europeans from politics.

 

* The English name of the Perussuomalaiset (PS) is officially the Finns Party. The names adopted by the PS, like True Finns or Finns Party, promote in our opinion nativist nationalism and xenophobia. We therefore prefer to use the Finnish name of the party on our postings. 

What does PS membership in the European Conservatives and Reformists group reveal about the Finnish populist party?

Posted on by Migrant Tales

One of the matters that one notices about the Perussuomalaiset (PS)* party is how it has metamorphosed and continues to do so. Even so, its stand on our social welfare state isn’t clear never mind what it thinks about EU membership, even if its leader, Timo Soini, now says that the party wants Finland to continue being a member of the EU. The party’s entry into the Europe of Conservatives and Reformists (ECR) is highly revealing, since it reinforces what we’ve known a long time about the PS. 

One matter it reveals is that the PS is an opportunistic party that doesn’t really have a clear stand on anything except that it polarizes instead of unites, speaks and stresses “us” and “them” in its rhetoric. Deep inside its reason for being hinges on anti-EU, anti-immigration, homophobic and especially anti-Islam stands.

Näyttökuva 2014-6-5 kello 10.39.08

Read full story (in Finnish) here.

A way to understand the PS stand on many issues is to check what the ECR stands for. Below are some of the principles that the European parliamentary group supports, according to Wikipedia:

  • Free enterprise, free and fair trade and competition, minimal regulation, lower taxation, and small government as the ultimate catalysts for individual freedom and personal and national prosperity.
  • Freedom of the individual, more personal responsibility and greater democratic accountability.
  • Sustainable, clean energy supply with an emphasis on energy security.
  • The importance of the family as the bedrock of society.
  • The sovereign integrity of the nation state, opposition to EU federalism and a renewed respect for true subsidiarity.
  • The overriding value of the transatlantic security relationship in a revitalized NATO, and support for young democracies across Europe.
  • Effectively controlled immigration and an end to abuse of asylum procedures
  • Efficient and modern public services and sensitivity to the needs of both rural and urban communities.
  • An end to waste and excessive bureaucracy and a commitment to greater transparency and probity in the EU institutions and use of EU funds.
  • Respect and equitable treatment for all EU countries, new and old, large and small.

In many respects, the PS stand on many of these issues is similar to the Youth League of the National Coalition Party, which is in favor of  “streamlining” the welfare state.

The Youth League of the National Coalition Party made 150 proposals last year that, if implemented, would turn Finland into a U.S.-modeled country where money is king. Some of the proposals made by the group are racist and xenophobic and in line with the most far right representatives of the Perussuomalaiset (PS) party.

The youth wings of the PS and National Coalition Party have lobbied to demote the Swedish language to elective status in schools.

* The Finnish name for the Finns Party is the Perussuomalaiset (PS). The names adopted by the PS, like True Finns or Finns Party, promote in our opinion nativist nationalism and xenophobia. We therefore prefer to use the Finnish name of the party on our postings. 

Financial Times: Finnish and Danish MEPs “with criminal records” join Conservative Prime Minister David Cameron’s group

Posted on by Migrant Tales

While some speculated that the Perussuomalaiset (PS)* and the Danish People’s Party (DPP), both with MEPs with criminal records, would be given the cold shoulder by UK Prime Minister David Cameron’s European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR) group,  the opposite happened, writes the Financial Times. 

The two MEPs with criminal records are PS MEP Jussi Halla-aho and DPP’s Morten Messerschmidt, who was convicted in 2002 for claiming that cultural diversity was linked to rape, violence and forced marriages.

Writes the Financial Times quoting Mats Persson of the Open Europe think-tank said:

This will raise the eyebrows of many in Europe who thought the Danish People’s party in particular wouldn’t pass the Tory party’s blush test…The good news for the Tories is that they’re on course to become the third largest party in the European Parliament. The risk however is that they drive reform-minded liberal parties straight into the arms of the big federalist block in the EP [European parliament].

PS chairman Timo Soini expressed satisfaction about being accepted into the ECR.

“Fifty-five MEPs have joined so far this group [ECR],” Soini was quoted as saying on YLE. “This group is in practice bigger than the Left and Green group [European United Left-Nordic Green Left].”

The PS and DPP used to belong to the Europe for Freedom and Democracy (EFD) group, with far-right parties like the  Slovak National Party, whose leader said that the best policy for dealing with the Roma is “a long whip in a small yard.”

With parties like the Lega Nord – formerly an EFD member – joining Marine Le Pen and the PS and DPP the ECR, the interesting matter to watch is if UKIP’s Nigel Farage will be able to get the seven parties and 27 MEPs are needed to form a group in the European parliament. 

 

Näyttökuva 2014-6-5 kello 1.16.38

 

Read full story here.

 

Another interesting question to ask is why Cameron permitted two anti-immigration parties with MEPs with criminal records to join the ECR?

One answer is that Cameron and his fellow conservatives in the group don’t care too much if a politician has been sentenced for ethnic agitation or has issues with racism. Taking into account the Tories’ anti-immigration rhetoric that has grown recently due to  the growth of the UKIP, this is nothing strange.

The PS’ entry into the ECR puts the party well into the conservative, populist and far-right camp.

* The Finnish name for the Finns Party is the Perussuomalaiset (PS). The names adopted by the PS, like True Finns or Finns Party, promote in our opinion nativist nationalism and xenophobia. We therefore prefer to use the Finnish name of the party on our postings. 

 

Der Spiegel International interviews National Front leader Marine Le Pen

Posted on by Migrant Tales

Der Spiegel International published an interview with Marine Le Pen, the leader of the far-right  National Front. While her views on the EU and cultural diversity don’t surprise us, what she says should concern us. One matter shines through in Le Pen’s message: France must leave the EU and stop immigration to realize her greatness as a nation. 

Näyttökuva 2014-6-4 kello 11.17.50

 Read full interview here.

The same logic that Le Pen uses was used by many autocratic nations like Nazi Germany, which blamed the Jews and other minorities that lived in the country for keeping Germans from becoming the “super race.”

While in a different context, Le Pen is basically saying the same thing: France has been destroyed by the EU, immigration and minorities.

One has only to look at Berlin in April-May 1945 to understand the destruction and terror that the Nazi regime brought on Europe came back like a boomerang to its doorsteps. In today’s world, you don’t build greatness with racism and nativist nationalism. You do it with global integration and values that promote cultural diversity through mutual acceptance, respect and equal opportunities.

Some of her answers dodge the question completely, like the one when the reporter asks her about xenophobia. Her answer: “Xenophobia is the hatred of foreigners. I don’t hate anyone.”

If you read some of the statements she’s made against Muslims and migrants, we could easily argue the contrary. She’s no friend of Muslims, migrants and minorities like gays.

As you read the interview, pay special attention if she offers viable solutions to issues like unemployment, competitiveness and global-EU integration. What you’ll see is a lot of scapegoating without any credible solutions except for leave the EU and stop immigration to France.

It’s too bad that the reporter didn’t ask Le Pen what she’d do with the millions of migrants and visible minorities living in France. Would she make a similar promise like Geert Wilders did in spring, when the Dutch politician said he’d reduce the number of Moroccans in Holland?

Read full interview here.

Counterpoint: How to compare European populist parties

Posted on by Migrant Tales

There’s been a lot of talk as of late in the media about far-right and populist parties that were elected to the European parliament. One way to assess these parties is a chart by Counterpoint, a research group. Gathering from the chart below, European populist parties are mostly racist, xenophobic, Islamophobic and sexist.

Their democratic contribution to healthy debate is questionable and it’s unclear if they’ll become more radicalized in the future.

A good example of radicalization is the UKIP, which apart from being more anti-EU before, took a strong anti-immigration stand in the European parliamentary elections. In Finland, there is concern that the Perussuomalaiset (PS)* may take a more vocal stand against immigrants as next year’s parliamentary elections near.

Migrant Tales disagrees with Counterpoint’s classification of the PS as a party with “low danger of racism.” While the party leadership may not make racist comments, they are rife among its members. Read racist quotes by the PS here.

If you are going to challenge intolerance, it’s a good matter that you know those who spread racism and prejudice.

Näyttökuva 2014-6-1 kello 9.15.18

 

Read full Counterpoint report here.

While the Finnish media hardly ever calls the PS a far-right party, the populist party was placed on such a list this week by the Huffington Post, Simon Wiesenthal Center and PolicyMic.

 

* The Finnish name for the Finns Party is the Perussuomalaiset (PS). The names adopted by the PS, like True Finns or Finns Party, promote in our opinion nativist nationalism and xenophobia. We therefore prefer to use the Finnish name of the party on our postings. 

Migrant Tales insight on EU elections: Win some, lose some

Posted on by Migrant Tales

As the political dust settles after the Euro elections last Sunday, can we claim like the media that the hard right made important gains?  How did anti-EU, anti-immigration and especially anti-Islam parties like the Perussuomalaiset (PS)* of Finland fare compared with the previous elections in 2009? 

Apart from the UKIP and National Front of France’s impressive election victories, there were some setbacks as well. The most notable of these were the defeat of Geert Wilders Freedom Party (PVV), which gained 16.97% of the vote in 2009 with 4 MEPs but saw its support plummet to 13.2% (4 MEPs). Other big losers were Vlaams Belang of Belgium (4.14%/1 MEP from 10.88%/2 MEPs) and Italy’s Lega Nord (6.15%/5 MEPs from 10.21%/9 MEPs).

Näyttökuva 2014-5-31 kello 15.02.00

See original posting here.

 

If I were the PS’ chairperson, Timo Soini, I’d be concerned about the poor showing of the party despite the fact that the party got  two MEPs elected.

Ever since the impressive victory of the Finnish anti-EU, anti-immigration, homophobic and especially anti-Islam party in the 2011 parliamentary elections, when it raised the number of MPs to 39 from 5 previously, it has been downhill ever since. In all of the elections after 2011, the PS has remained a low-teens party and not been able to match its 2011 election victory (see table below).

Näyttökuva 2014-5-31 kello 15.44.19

 

While 70% of the EU MEPs elected throughout Europe on Sunday are pro-EU, parties like the PS with MEPs like Jussi Halla-aho are finding out rapidly that the European media has a better memory than the Finnish media.

After bashing migrants and victimizing other minorities in Finland, the PS wants greater respectability by leaving the anti-EU and anti-immigration Europe for Freedom and Democracy (EFD) for the European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR) bloc. The Financial Times reported this week that the PS’ membership in the ECR would be a liability because of Halla-aho’s sentence for ethnic agitation.

Even if Halla-aho tallied about a third (80,772) of the PS vote, he did so mainly on an anti-immigration message, traveling as far as Lieksa, where a PS councilman demanded a “Somali-free” meeting room, to spread his diatribes against Muslims and cultural diversity.

Taking into account the disappointing results of the PS in the past three elections, the big question is if the party will ratchet up its anti-immigration and anti-Islam rhetoric as the April 2015 parliamentary elections near. If the PS loses half of its half-a-million votes next year, it means that it will send the party back to the minor political leagues.

Of the anti-EU and anti-immigration parties that were clear victors in the EU elections, two emerge: UKIP and the National Front.

The most impressive of the two is Marine Le Pen’s National Front, which won the election with 24.95% (24 MEPs) from 6.3% (3 MEPs) previously. Nigel Farage’s UKIP became the first party since the early twentieth century to beat the Conservatives and Labor in an election. It gained 26.77% (24 MEPs) of the vote versus 16.09% (13 MEPs).

Other anti-immigration parties that did well in the  elections were the Danish Folk Party (26.6%/4 MEPs from 14.8%/2 MEPs), Freedom Party of Austria (19.7%/4 MEPs from 14.8%/2 MEPs), Sweden Democrats (9.7%/2 MEPs from 3.27%/-), and neo-Nazi and anti-Semitic parties like the Golden Dawn of Greece (9.38%/3 MEPs), Hungary’s Jobbik (14.68%/3 MEPs from 14.77%/3 MEPs), NPD of Germany (1.00%/1 MEP).

HOPE not hate European Editor Graeme Atkinson put the EU elections in the following words:

So just where is this generalized, much talked-about, media-hyped rise of fascism, rise of right-wing extremism etc [except in France]? Because even with the huge increase in FN [National Front] support, the overall far right vote in the EU grew only by 1.57 million over the 2009 score with an additional country Croatia in the mix. Indeed, apart from in the UK [if we include UKIP], Denmark, Hungary and France, the far right lost votes everywhere and only won 34 seats.

It’s unlikely that the two largest anti-EU and anti-immigration parties in the European parliament, UKIP and the National Front, will form an alliance.

As far as the far right, anti-EU and anti-immigration MEPs are concerned in the new European parliament, they continue to be a small minority but with a louder voice.

 

* The Finnish name for the Finns Party is the Perussuomalaiset (PS). The names adopted by the PS, like True Finns or Finns Party, promote in our opinion nativist nationalism and xenophobia. We therefore prefer to use the Finnish name of the party on our postings. 

The PS of Finland is named again on a list with other far-right and neo-Nazi European parties

Posted on by Migrant Tales

On Monday the Huffington Post listed the Perussuomalaiset (PS)* as one of the nine scariest parties to be elected to the European parliament in the “good” company of xenophobic and neo-Nazi parties like the National Front of France and Golden Dawn of Greece, respectively.  On Tuesday, PolicyMic listed the PS as “one of the reasons we should be terrified about the people who just took power in Europe.” 

Näyttökuva 2014-5-30 kello 11.58.58

 

Read full story on PolicyMic here.

 

On Wednesday, the PS’ name popped up again when the Simon Wiesenthal Center named it as one of ten parties it will monitor closely for  spreading xenophobia, nativist nationalism, anti-immigration rhetoric and anti-Semitism.

The Simon Wiesenthal Center listed the PS with neo-Nazi parties like the NPD of Germany, Golden Dawn and Hungary’s Jobbik.

Helsingin Sanomat, Finland’s largest daily, published on Wednesday citing the Huffington Post’s story on the nine scariest parties elected to the European parliament.

The PS has members who are Holocaust deniers and who play down the atrocities committed by Nazi Germany.

One of these is newly elected PS MEP Halla.aho.

Kuvankaappaus 2013-10-3 kello 0.36.10

This picture by one of Halla-aho’s close allies in parliament, James Hirvisaari, caused the MP to be sacked from the party in October. Read full story here.

* The Finnish name for the Finns Party is the Perussuomalaiset (PS). The names adopted by the PS promote nativist nationalism and xenophobia. We therefore prefer to use the Finnish name of the party on our postings. 

Simon Wiesenthal Center will monitor the PS as one of ten parties for spreading xenophobia and anti-Semitism

Posted on by Migrant Tales

After being named one of the nine scariest parties to be elected to the European parliament by Huffington Post, the Simon Wiesenthal Center, the  global Jewish human rights organization that challenges anti-Semitism, issued a statement where it names the Perussuomalaiset (PS) as one of ten parties it will monitor closely for  spreading xenophobia, nativist nationalism, anti-immigration rhetoric and anti-Semitism.

Placing the PS in the political company of France’s National Front, the neo-Nazi and far-right NPD of Germany, Greece’s Golden Dawn and Jobbik of Hungary, shouldn’t come to a surprise. What is, however, surprising how uncritically the Finnish media has treated the PS, especially when it comes to its anti-immigration and anti-Islam views.

Concerned by the rise of xenophobia and anti-Semitism in Europe, the Simon Wiesenthal Center called on in early May EU Vice President Catherine Ashton to condemn the entry of “hatemongers into the European Parliament, launch an investigation into their source of funding” and “urge the parliamentary faction blocs to ostracize them.”

Näyttökuva 2014-5-29 kello 9.08.08
Read full statement here.

The interesting question we should be asking is why have publications like the Huffington Post and now the Simon Wiesenthal Center listed the PS? Why has the Finnish media been more “understanding” and commonly let off the anti-EU, anti-immigration, homophobic and especially anti-Islam party easily off the hook for its hostility against migrants and visible minorities?

The answer is pretty clear since the Finnish media is part of the problem. It gives too often racists inflated respectability and importance.

Opposition to the PS and politicians who spread racism and hatred, and who have been sentenced on top of it for ethnic agitation, should never be considered “normal” politicians but outright extremists that are a threat to our way of life.

The PS has members who are Holocaust deniers and who play down the atrocities committed by Nazi Germany.

One of these is newly elected PS MEP Halla.aho.

Kuvankaappaus 2013-10-3 kello 0.36.10

 

 

In October, PS MP James Hirvisaari got sacked from the party after he took a picture of a friend making a Nazi salute in parliament.

 

 

 

 

Financial Times: MEP Jussi Halla-aho racist track record leaves PS out in the cold

Posted on by Migrant Tales

Success comes with a high political price especially if you base that success on spreading racism and prejudice. That is exactly the case of the Perussuomalaiset (PS),* who are hoping to join the European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR) in Brussels but have been rejected by them because they see PS MEP Jussi Halla-aho as too racist, according to the Financial Times.

The Financial Times writes in another story that the freshly elected MEP, who was convicted in 2012 for “stirring ethnic tensions,” said “…something about the prophet Muhammad that we dare not repeat on a family blog. The True Finns [PS] also briefly suspended him from the party after he suggested that Greece’s debt problems could only be solved by a military junta [he retracted the comments].”

What is interesting to note is that the same anti-immigration and anti-Islam message spearheaded by Halla-aho and his cronies that was decisive for the PS’ historic victory in the 2011 parliamentary elections, is turning into its political epitaph to ever becoming a credible and mainstream political party.

The 12.9% showing of the PS on Sunday is still a long way off from the 19.1% it won in 2011. The PS’ showing in the presidential (9.4%) and municipal elections (12.3%) were equally disappointing.

If the same trend continues, it means that the PS will face a big upset in next year’s parliamentary elections.

Näyttökuva 2014-5-28 kello 22.34.38

Read full story here.

Knocking at the ECR’s door is another close ally of the PS, the far-right Danish People’s Party (DPP), which won the euro elections in its country by doubling the number of MEPs to 4 from 2009.

According to the Financial Times, both the PS and DPP both have MEPs that were convicted for ethnic agitation and therefore carry a lot of political baggage.

I find it very difficult to believe that [David] Cameron’s Conservatives, with whom we work closely to promote innovative, open and competitive societies, would team up with the True Finns whose rise is to large extent based on xenophobia and backward-looking 1980s nostalgia, writes the Financial Times, quoting one senior Finnish official.

While it’s clear that the PS is eyeing next year’s parliamentary elections and therefore is keen on joining the ECR group in order to get greater respectability, the big question is where they’ll end up in Brussels.

Moreover, even if the PS wishes to make its anti-EU, anti-immigration, homophobic and especially anti-Islam stand mainstream, it’s another question if Europe’s mainstream parties will permit them to join their club.

PS leader Timo Soini says that joining Marine Le Pen’s is out of the question even if the National Front leader has courted the PS to join the European Alliance for Freedom, a new hard-right group spearheaded by the French politician.

That leaves the PS with Nigel Farage’s UKIP and the Europe Freedom and Democracy group (EFD), where members like the Lega Nord of Italy, which praised Anders Breivik for murdering 77 innocent victims on 22/7, are defecting.

Will Farage and Le Penn join forces? Will the PS be part of that new political group?

Time will tell.

Even if anti-EU and anti-immigration groups made gains in countries like France and the United Kingdom, 70% of the European parliament’s 751 MEPs belong to pro-EU groups in the center-left and center-right.

* The Finnish name for the Finns Party is the Perussuomalaiset (PS). The names adopted by the PS promote nativist nationalism and xenophobia. We therefore prefer to use the Finnish name of the party on our postings. 

Disingenuous Finnish PS MEP-elect Jussi Halla-aho fears image would suffer with parties like far-right National Front

Posted on by Migrant Tales

In an interview on YLE, Perussuomalaiset (PS) newly elected MEP Jussi Halla-aho said that it was doubtful that the anti-immigration party would form part of a parliamentary group with far-right parties like the National Front of France “because the party’s image would suffer.”

What a disingenuous statement by a politician who has based his career together with the PS on spreading racism and hatred of Muslims and migrants. Moreover, hasn’t he considered that the only group where the PS will be accepted is the present one, or the Europe for Freedom and Democracy?

If put in the right context, Halla-aho is saying that the PS’ image would suffer ever-greater damage if it grouped with parties like the National Front.

The French xenophobic party’s leader, Marine Le Pen, has said that she would like the PS to form part of her new group in the European parliament.

Näyttökuva 2014-5-27 kello 7.07.39

Read full story here.

 

Without naming the National Front or Geert Wilders’ Party for Freedom, Halla-aho said that far-right anti-immigration parties in Europe were in the same ideological ballpark as the PS.

In the face of Halla-aho’s comments, what then is the difference between the Lega Nord of Italy, which praised Anders Breivik after he murdered 77 victims on 22/7, and parties like the National Front?

The PS can blame itself and its actions for its right-wing populist, far-right and nationalistic anti-immigration, homophobic and especially anti-Islam image.

The PS forms part to the same European parliament group as the Lega Nord, Danish People’s Party, UKIP and others in the Europe of Freedom and Democracy group.