Finnish conservatives form a coalition with the extreme right in power

Finland’s conservative Kokoomus party has reached an agreement on a coalition government with the far-right True Finns partyThe Swedish People’s Party (SFP) and the Christian Democrats, whose program will be presented today.

Two and a half months after the victory of the conservative Kokoomus in the parliamentary elections, its leader and appointed head of government Petteri Orpo announced the coalition agreement with the other three parties last night and declared that he was “proud of the good program” that emerged from the negotiations.

At the start of negotiations on May 2, Orp’s goal was to reach an agreement before June on the formation of a coalition executive that would have 108 of the 200 seats in eduskunta (Parliament of Finland), a large enough majority to implement their reformist program.

The main priority of the conservatives is agree on a budget adjustment of 6,000 million euros in the next four years, by reducing public spending and increasing productivity and the employment rate.

During the negotiations, there were heated discussions between the right-wing populists and the SFP on issues related to development policy, immigration and climate protection, and the True Finns threatened to withdraw from the negotiations.

Orp’s conservatives won the April parliamentary elections with 20.6 percent votes, followed by the True Finns (20.1%) and the social democrats of former head of government Sanna Marin.