After the leaked party video, the politician did a drug test, as her critics demand. The once youngest prime minister in the world has been governing the country for almost three years.
Sanna Marin, the Prime Minister of Finland, is currently under criticism.
Is Sanna Marin a young, modern and cool head of government who works hard and works hard just as hard? Or did the 36-year-old social democrat go over the top this time and prove with the leaked video – which shows her drunk and dancing wildly at a party with friends – that she lacks political judgement? And that she is naïve enough to believe that a private film could not be made public?
Opinions in Finland differ. In addition to criticism from her own ranks and from the opposition, she also received understanding: Why shouldn’t a high-ranking politician celebrate in her free time? The request to take a drug test Marin followed on Friday. The married mother of a four-year-old daughter emphasized again in front of the media that she had never taken drugs, either at the festival in question or when she was young.
The “Women’s Cabinet” has held since 2019
There is currently little talk of Marin’s track record. The social democrat has been in charge of government affairs in Finland since December 2019 after her party colleague Rinne had to resign after a comprehensive postal strike. The then 34-year-old not only made headlines as the world’s youngest prime minister, but also with a lot of “girl power”: Not only were the party leaders of the other four coalition partners female – women also occupied a clear majority of ministerial posts. Marin had to be accused of falling below the required gender quota of 40 percent with a male share of 37 percent.
The five-party government focused on social and equality issues and combating the environmental crisis. Finland has set itself the goal of becoming carbon neutral by 2035. Marin’s reign has been largely overshadowed by the corona pandemic, during which she imposed short-term lockdowns on the country and temporarily rigorously sealed the borders. Since taking office, the coalition has survived several votes of no confidence and settled internal disputes, but has also been able to push ahead with important reforms. This includes, above all, the restructuring of the social and health care system – one of the most comprehensive projects in decades. The reform, which brought down a middle-class government in 2019, will transfer responsibility for the health sector from the almost 300 municipalities to 21 newly created regions from next year.
Despite her young age, Marin’s move into the Kesäranta service villa came as no surprise, given that she had a solid political career behind her. Marin had joined the Young Social Democrats while she was studying administrative sciences, a natural choice given her background: after her parents divorced early on, she grew up in modest circumstances with her mother. Higher education was not a matter of course, Marin was the first in her family to dare to go to university. She then served as chairwoman of the city council in Tampere, Finland’s third largest city, for four years. In 2015, Marin was elected to the Finnish Parliament for the first time; after her re-election in 2019, she became transport minister in the Rinne cabinet, which lasted only five months.
Not the first scandal
In Marin’s 30-month tenure, the party video wasn’t the first slip. In December, for example, she missed the request to self-isolate after contact with a corona infected minister. Marin wasn’t nodding off on the sofa at home, but was having fun in a trendy bar in Helsinki – without a government cell phone. And a year ago, the media took advantage of the fact that Marin spent 850 euros a month on breakfast at state expense. This was not illegal, however, and the young politician was not the first to make use of these “additional costs”.
Nor is she the first to make active use of social networks and upset her (currently) almost 800,000 followers Instagram shows baby bump and wedding pictures. Nice Alexander Stubb, Conservative Prime Minister from 2014 to 2015, was a master of self-portrayal. The eloquent beaming man and “Mister Twitter” blogged, smiled for the cameras where he could, and put himself in the limelight during triathlon training, for example. However, the social democrat Marin has one thing ahead of her conservative predecessor: while the Europe enthusiast Stubb was not heard with his desire to lead Finland into NATO, the former accession opponent Marin will go down in history as the head of government who put an end to Finland’s freedom of alliance .