While politicians of the Finns Party (PS) and National Coalition Party beat their chests every time Finland tightens its migration policy, the two minor government parties, the Swedish People’s Party and Christian Democrats, look the other way with shameful silence.
The government, especially the PS, claims that its anti-immigration policies will make us stronger as a nation. The logic has a striking connection with the Nazi racebook. In that logic, they believed that getting rid of the Jews would help make the Germans realize their full potential and become the master race.
Today in Finland, like in other countries of the EU there is a similar logic: Let’s stop people like Muslims from settling inside our borders.
Finland’s transformation from a liberal Nordic welfare state to one that is showing signs of becoming iliberal is concerning to say the least. If there was a watershed that pushed Finland in this direction it was in July, when it approved the pushback law by denying people asylum thereby shelving its Human Rights commitments, Constitutional rights and internaitonal agreements.
This pictures the long struggle by Interior Minister Mari Rantanen, Finance Minister Riikka Purra, and the Perussuomalaiset* to shelve Human Rights, Constitutional Rights, and international agreements by Finland thanks to the passage of the pushback law in July. Source Twitter/Kalle Koponen, HS
Other shameful policy changes will weaken us and impoverish Finland.
Some of these include:
· changing the period of residence for citizenship from five to eight years;
· tougher requirements to get permanent residence and citizenship;
· prohibiting asylum seekers from getting a work permit;
· residence permits granted under international protection will become
temporary and their duration will be the EU minimum;
· speeding up deportations and asylum applications;
· tighter family reunification requirements;
· if laid off and cannot find new employment, a person will be forced to leave
the country in three (non-specialists) or six months (specialists);
· taking away the right of undocumented migrants (excluding children and others in a particularly vulnerable position) to only have access to emergency health care services;
· reviewing dual citizenship rights to Russian nationals.
One may ask a very simple question concerning the latter. Why are you doing this?
Behind that simple question, you will find nothing more than the offspring of racism: suspicion and hatred.
Thirteen years ago, I wrote about the 2011 general election, in which the PS increased the number of MPs to 38 from five previously.
I headlined the story, “a perilous watershed,” and wrote: “Far-right populism is an illness inflicting Europe at present and it now has a beachhead in Finland.”
Read the original posting here.
