Column|President Alexander Stubb shows his handprint in Finland’s foreign and security policy.
In spring the president who finished his second term Sauli Niinistö regularly repeated since 2014 when talking about the eastern neighbor Russia, how “a Cossack takes what is badly held”.
Niinistö himself applied the same in his duties as president: if there was a powerless taker in the presidential institution’s foreign and security policy, it was quickly in Niinistö’s hands.
If, in Niinistö’s opinion, prime ministers or foreign ministers made the mistake of stepping onto his property, they were immediately taught a lesson. However, Niinistö himself also took a stand on things that had nothing to do with his own rootel.
From spring who sat as president until 2011, and was also the subject of Niinistö’s public feedback as prime minister Alexander Stubb has shown in recent weeks that he will continue on the path of his predecessor: he does not intend to remain as president only as a master of ceremonies. The style is just different.
According to the State Council’s foreign and security policy report published last week, Finland’s foreign policy is based on “value-based realism”. It is a slogan repeated by Stubbs during the election campaign, which ended up in the final paper by some members of the parliamentary working group of criticism despite.
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Partly it’s about a real style change.
This week, Stubb spoke to MTV in the interview about the importance of enacting a “conversion law”, even though the parliament’s decision does not actually belong to the president. To support his position, Stubb presented figures based on intelligence that have not been discussed in the public debate before.
The timing was hardly a coincidence: the law was discussed at the time of the statement in the parliament’s administrative committee, where the governing parties worked to get Sdp representatives behind the joint report.
Otherwise like his predecessor, Stubb has tried to keep his positions as diplomatic as possible and avoided any personal criticism.
In part, this is due to the fact that the season is only at the beginning and popular popularity is not as guaranteed as in Niinistö: Stubbs still dares to speak out and his statements are criticized criticize. Partly it’s about a real style change and a desire to stand out from the predecessor.
Research by Finns need a strong president who can also exceed his authority if necessary. In the next few years, we will see if Stubb’s more conciliatory approach will last until the end of the presidential term and if it will be possible to achieve the same popular popularity as Niinistö’s tyranny.
The author is HS’s politics editor.
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