Finland’s new economic affairs minister and member of the nationalist Finns Party, Vilhelm Junnila, survived a confidence vote in parliament on Wednesday.
MPs votes on the measure fell 95-86 with three abstentions and 15 absences.
The confidence vote was called by three opposition parties, the Left Alliance, Green and Social Democratic parties, due to Junnila’s previous controversial statements and links to far-right groups.
Seven Swedish People’s Party MPs voted against Junnila, with the other three abstaining. Three National Coalition MPs were absent for the vote, but the other government party MPs voted their confidence in the controversial politician.
Junnila has joked about his election number (88) referencing ‘Heil Hitler’, campaigned at an election under the “gas” slogan and spoken at at least one event organised by a far-right group.
The recently-appointed minister apologised last week for his comments and actions, following two days of media controversy about the matter.
MPs also voted on the government programme, with 106 voting to support it, 78 voting against, and one abstention. 15 legislators were away for that vote.
I get what you’re saying, but at the same time, we can’t start fucking around with nazis and letting them creep in. We just can’t.
Remember, the nazis taking power in Germany in the 40s was done democratically, and everything they did after that was “legal.”
I’m not anti-democratic, but just because something’s done democratically or legally doesn’t necessarily mean it’s right.
It’s a very common misconception that the Nazis democratically came to power in Weimar Germany. Besides the regular everyday street violence they conducted with their brownshirts, president Hindenburg had been ignoring the parliament and setting up his own government via presidential decree for some time. Prussia (a social-democrat stronghold) had been illegally overtaken in a coup by the then chancellor Franz von Papen.
The only reason Hitler became chancellor is because of the internal squabbles the conservatives around Hindenburg had, and the compromise they agreed upon was to give (again via presidential decree, the parliament was absolutely irrelevant) Hitler the chancellorship and the police, since they thought that he was an inexperienced fool they could easily handle.
With the police in his hands, the SA could start killing, looting and burning places belonging to their political opponents without any worries. After the Reichstag fire, the socialists (2nd biggest party) and the communists (3rd biggest party) were were being murdered and arrested in such quantities, they had to open up concentration camps just to have a place where to put them. The election campaign of 1933 was a symphony of Nazi violence, and they still didn’t have a majority in the Reichstag. It took a lot of threats, violence, backroom deals and the support of Hindenburg for the Nazis to get the enabling act through the Reichstag, after which they were essentially the law.
The Nazi seizure of power was everything except democratic. The courts, people and most parties were against democracy to begin with, but by the time the Nazis had any real “legal” power, the voice of the people was absolutely irrelevant since the president could and did rule by decree, bypassing the Reichstag, and even outright illegal actions such as the coup in Prussia was just brushed over by the courts stacked with conservative judges who’ve been there since Bismarck.