Finland and Finnish News

Country Profile
Finland officially the Republic of Finalnd is in Northern Europe and is the most sparsely populated country in the EU.Finland is a country of thousands of lakes and islands—187,888 lakes (larger than 500 m²/0.12 acre) and 179,584 islands.Forest covers 86% of the country's area,the largest forested area in Europe.The share of foreign citizens in Finland is 3.4%, among the lowest in the EU.
Capital                                Helsinki
Currency                             Euro
Official Language                 Finnish and Swedish
Population                           5.4 Million(2011 Estimate)

History
The Finnish declaration of independence was adopted by the Parliament of Finland on Dec 06,1917.Finland became a Presidential Republic with Kaarlo Juho Stahlberg elected as its 1st President in 1919.

 

Politics and Government
Finland is a parliamentary Representative Democratic Republic and of a Multi Party System.The President is the Head of State and the Prime Minister is the Head of Govt.

President of Finland
The President is elected directly by the people for a term of six years. Since 1991, no President may be elected for more than two consecutive terms. 

Sauli Vainamo Niinisto(National Coalition Party) is the 12th and current President of Finland in office from March 01,2012.

2012 Finnish Presidential Election -Jan 22 and Feb 05,2012

In the 2012 Presidential Election,Sauli Vainamo Niinisto won the first round gettting 37% votes against Pekka Haavisto(Green League) who got 18.8% of the votes.
Sauli Niinistö won the second round with 62.6 % of the votes (1.8 million votes), while Pekka Haavisto received 37.4 % of the votes (1.1 million votes).

Sauli Niinisto(National Coalition Party)who was Finance Minister when Finland adopted the euro in 2002 has won Finland's Presidential Election and will become the country's 1st Conservative Head of State in 5 Decades.
Sauli Niinisto will become the first president from the conservative National Coalition party since 1956, and the first in 30 years from a party other than the center-left Social Democrats.
Sauli Niinisto will replace Tarja Halonen, one of Finland's most popular heads of state, who has served the maximum two six-year terms.
Former finance minister Sauli Niinisto defeats first openly gay presidential candidate Pekka Haavisto and will become the country's first conservative head of state in five decades.


Prime Minister of Finland
The President of Finland nominates a Prime Minister after the parties in the Eduskunta/Riksdag (Parliament of Finland) have negotiated the distribution of seats in the new Council of State(made up of the PM and ministers for the various departments of the government ) and the government's programme. Parliament must ratify the nominated Prime Minister with an absolute majority in a Vote without other candidates.

 Jyrki Tapani Katainen(Chairman of NCP) is the current PM of Finland in office from June 22,2011


Eduskunta/Riksdag (Parliament of Finland)

The 200-member Unicameral Parliament of Finland is called the Eduskunta (Finnish) or Riksdag (Swedish) who are elected for a four-year term on the basis of proportional representation in multi seat constituencies.

Political Parties in Finland
Finland's proportional representation system encourages a multitude of Political Parties and has resulted in many coalition-cabinets.
Finland has a Multi Party System, with 3 Strong Parties, in which no one party often has a chance of gaining power alone, and Parties must work with each other to form Coalition Govts.


2011 Finnish Parliamentary Election - April 17,2011
The election resulted in the incumbent, Centre Party-led coalition, which included the NCP, Green League and Swedish People's Party(SPP), lost its majority by two seats and the PM Mari Kiviniemi of the Centre Party signaled that her party would then sit in opposition.
The results of the election are -
National Coalition Party(NCP)secured 20.4% Votes and got 44 Seats

Social Democratic Party(SDP) of Finland secured 19.1% Votes and got 42 Seats

True Finns Party secured 19.1% Votes and got 39 Seats

Centre Right Party secured 15.8% Votes and got 35 Seats

Left Alliance secured 8.1% Votes and got 14 Seats

Green League secured 7.3% Votes and got 10 Seats

Swedish People's Party(SPP) secured 4.3% Votes and got 9 Seats

Christian Democrats secured 4% Votes and got 6 Seats

The incumbent Minister of Finance,Jyrki Tapani Katainen(Chairman of NCP)formed a 6 Party Coalition Govt consisting of NCP;SDP;Left Alliance;Green League;Christian Democrats and SPP