Comment: Here is an interesting story by YLE about candidates in the April 17 election with immigrant backgrounds. What is a bit disturbing about the story is that there are different definitions on what constitutes an immigrant. One of the candidates, for example, has an Ethiopian father but was born in Espoo.
Why do they make a big thing about these candidates background? Aren’t they Finns since they are citizenship?
Even if by a miracle all of the 48 candidates with immigrant backgrounds got elected, it would not even constitute a majority in the 200-seat Eduskunta.
The party with the most “immigrant” candidates were the Greens and the True Finns with the least.
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Maahanmuutto on yksi eduskuntavaalien kuumimmista puheenaiheista. Maahanmuuttajaehdokkaita on kuitenkin vaaleissa vain 45. Määrä riippuu myös laskutavasta. Maahanmuuttajaksi on laskettu myös ehdokkaita, joiden isä tai äiti on ulkomaalainen.
The read on click here.
Interesting that the much smaller SFP/RKP and Christian Democrats have proportionately so many more candidates of an immigrant background than the huge party machines of e.g. Centre and Kokoomus can manage to find.
On the subject of Yle, I doubt that FST’s Närbild programme is a part of anyone’s regular viewing habits here, but they featured a (not particularly insightful) human interest story on a family of Iraqi refugees in Karis this evening. It can also be seen on Yle’s website: http://arenan.yle.fi/video/1301248227763 . Might be interesting for someone here.
Thank you Jonas for this. You are absolutely right: smaller parties like SFP and KD have more people with immigrant background than the big three. The group of candidates with immigrant backgrounds are a heteregenous group. In the True Finns you have one candidate who signed the xenophobic Nuiva manifest. It’s like what Martin Luther King said: People should be judged by their character not their skin color.