Since she had to cede the leadership of the Norwegian government to the Labor Jonas Gahr Store, in October 2021, after having held it for eight years, nothing seemed to be able to prevent the conservative Erna Solberg from becoming Prime Minister again at the end of the next legislative elections, in 2025. The last local elections, on September 11, were a good omen: for the first time since 1924, the Hoyre party, which she has led since 2004, came in first ahead of that of Jonas Garh Store.
A few days later, his victory was swept away by a wave of scandals which still shakes the Norwegian political class. It must be said that, since July 30, the economic newspaper E24 asked Erna Solberg, 62, to make public the list of stock market transactions carried out by her husband, Sindre Finnes, while she was prime minister, between 2013 and 2021.
On September 15, Sindre Finnes, an executive with the Federation of Norwegian Industries, finally complied. To everyone’s surprise, he announced that he had carried out more than three thousand transactions, for an estimated gain of 1.8 million crowns (157,000 euros). Some of these operations concern public companies and maintain doubts about the information available to him at the time.
During a press conference, Erna Solberg, on the verge of tears, talks about “a breakdown of trust” in his relationship. She assures that her husband lied to her and admits that she may have been guilty of conflicts of interest without his knowledge. However, she refuses to resign and promises to hire a ” baby sitter “ to oversee her husband’s financial dealings if she becomes prime minister again in 2025.
Norwegians in shock
For Norwegians, it’s a shock. In the Scandinavian kingdom, trust in politicians is traditionally high. But “there is a very thin line between trust and naivety”, notes Kim Arne Hammerstad, author of a book titled Politiske skandaler (“Political Scandals”, Res Publica, 2020, untranslated). The journalist sees in these serial revelations the fruit of serious investigations, carried out by the Norwegian media, which, in recent years, have chosen investigative journalism.
The big unpacking began in mid-summer, first affecting the majority in power. On July 21, journalists fromE24 establish that in January, Minister of Research and Higher Education Ola Borten Moe, number two in the Center Party, purchased 400,000 crowns worth of shares in the public company Kongsberg Gruppen, a 25% shareholder in the producer of Nammo ammunition, a week before the government approved a multi-billion crown contract with Nammo. The minister tenders his resignation. He is not the first.
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