Book | Matti Vanhase had a close relationship with Sanna Marini

For a long time politician of the line Matti Vanhanen (kesk) published a memoir based on his diary entries on Wednesday about the events of the 2019–2023 election period. The name of the book is In the midst of crises – a view of the reality of state management.

The name of the book is apt, because we were really in the midst of crises at that time. At the beginning of 2020, a pandemic broke out and in February 2022, Russia started its war of aggression against Ukraine. Vanhanen followed the crises from the vantage point, as he served as Speaker of the Parliament, Minister of Finance and then again as Speaker during the election period.

Despite the starting points, the book is not very flashy. Vanhanen himself admits that, for example, the prime minister in the fall of 2019 didn’t quite figure it out Antti Rinne (sd) the relevance of the events leading to the separation. The dramatic difference goes with brief mentions in the diaries.

“The president is not always at the heart of everything,” Vanhanen writes, referring to his own position.

During his tenure as Minister of Finance from June 2020 to May 2021, Vanhanen did not have time to make diary entries at all.

There are no big revelations in the book. However, it is interesting to read what the parliament’s NATO membership process looked like from Speaker Vanhanen’s advice. However, the book’s greatest gift is that the diaries give a good picture of the former prime minister’s republican thinking.

Matti Vanhanen is above all a strong advocate of parliamentarism.

In the book Vanhanen’s role as prime minister comes to the fore Sanna Marini (sd) as a supporter and advisor. Vanhase has political experience, as he served as prime minister from 2003 to 2010.

In his first meeting with the new prime minister in December 2019, Vanhanen says that he encouraged him in every way. “He listened to my own experiences. I have a good image of him,” Vanhanen writes.

Vanhanen’s positive attitude towards the young prime minister is repeated many times in the diary entries. The two had an obviously confidential relationship.

As an example, let’s say March 2020, when the parliament decided to introduce a contingency law due to the coronavirus situation. Vanhanen says that he discussed the nature of the emergency law with Marin in the dome of the parliament. Marin had told Vanhanen that “every morning he wakes up like a nightmare, can this be true”.

According to the diary, Marin asked Vanhase for support during the corona crisis, especially in situations where the prime minister felt like the president Sauli Niinistön trying to address domestic political issues.

On March 14, 2000, Vanhanen says he was skiing in Lapland when Marin called and asked how he should react to Sauli Niinistö’s activity and plans to establish a so-called separate corona fist.

Vanhanen recommended that the prime minister start holding daily corona situation reviews, which would take space away from Niinistö.

Vanhanen told Marin on the phone that he had heard that Niinistö is in contact with party leaders due to the virus. “It doesn’t suit him. There shouldn’t be an image of two leaders.”

After that, Marin thanked Vanhas for his previous statement, according to which the refugee situation in Greece belongs to the government and not the president.

Corona fist Vanhanen’s parliamentary thinking is well summed up in opposition. Vanhanen says that Sdp’s Antti Rinne came to him on March 27, 2020 to talk “very worried”.

Rinne had heard of background discussions according to which the Defense Forces, the police and also the president would play a strong role in the ‘fist’ or ‘security committee’. According to Rinne, the coalition members also talked about an ’emergency government’, in which, according to Rinne’s interpretation, the Left Alliance and the Greens would be replaced by the coalition.

“I thought that the discussion about the fists had gone too far beyond the presenter’s thoughts. We were of the exact same opinion that the management system must be in accordance with the constitution, and it should not ignore the prime minister, the government and, through them, the parliament,” Vanhanen writes.

Vanhanen says that he told President Niinistö that, in his opinion, crisis management must be directly under the prime minister.

Also a former prime minister Paavo Lipponen (sd) was, according to Vanhanen, worried about the behind-the-scenes power dispute related to crisis management.

“We agreed on the role of the prime minister and on keeping the border clear between the different state bodies. Lipponen said he would calm down after hearing my position. I believe that the president means well to support the government, but staying out of the way is easily seen as criticism that the ‘young people’ don’t know how,” Vanhanen writes.

Best The content of Vanhanen’s diaries actually boils down to a single entry made on May 5, 2020. Almost all the themes of the book can be found in that diary entry.

To the beginning of the update, Vanhanen tells about the briefing given by Prime Minister Sanna Marini to the chairmen of the parliamentary groups. “The basic line is logical,” Vanhanen praises the prime minister’s performance.

After this, Vanhanen says that he got to know the new, Harriet Lonkan and Kari Laitinen led to a report on the national security impact assessment.

“It supports my long-term goal of having a crisis management model led by the prime minister in Finland,” Vanhanen writes.

Vanhanen reminds us that during the time of Swedish rule, legislation was created in favor of strong authorities to prevent the king’s monopoly. The same was repeated during the imperial rule, when legislation emphasized the importance of laws and authority. In this way, an effort was made to block the possibility of St. Petersburg interfering in Finland’s affairs.

According to Vanhanen, due to this old tradition, Finnish legislation has divided power between sector ministries and sector ministers. These jurisdictional limits raise the threshold to leave the “first fire” to centralize power.

“I clearly support a crisis management system led by the prime minister, which is directly under the supervision of the parliament through our parliamentarism. This way of thinking does not need the old world power concentrations operating at the edges of the system, but the crisis must be managed with the same organization and responsibility relationships as in normal times. This is the basis for why I did not support the president’s ‘fist'”, writes Vanhanen.

This declaration emphasizing parliamentarism is the central message of Vanhanen’s diaries.

This one after that, in the same diary entry, Vanhanen returns to his low-key style and says that he didn’t even have many goals for the election period in question. As Speaker, he hoped that the practices of parliamentary work could be reformed and that a clear structure should be defined for crisis management.

“I also try to watch that left-wing forces do not cause damage in corporate/property taxation in some compromise,” Vanhanen writes.

“Then the season can end and the retirement days begin!”

At the end of the diary entry made on May 5, 2020, Vanhanen’s enthusiasm grows, because he gets to his favorite topic, i.e. house building. The diary follows the completion of the new house with piety.

“I got a construction project for exterior buildings as an electrical contractor Iiro Suorelan From Lepsämä. I met him in the evening on the lot,” Vanhanen writes.

Vanhanen moved to his new house in the spring of 2021. He retired at the end of the election period in 2023.