COMMENTARY: The law, morals, and a dodgy memory

By Hanna Kaarto
     
      From the moment when the gong sounded for Round 2 of the election financing mess from last year, after new revelations on Thursday by the commercial TV channel MTV3, the leading figures in the Centre Party - chairman Matti Vanhanen and party secretary Jarmo Korhonen - have stressed that they were not the active parties in asking for funds.
      The entrepreneurs supplying the election cash were the ones who contacted them first.
      What should we think of this? Does this marching order wash the politicians clean of all moral suspicions - the fact that they did not go around with a begging-bowl but merely passively accepted the money from business interests whose aim was to influence the outcome of the election and the name on the prime minister's door, as the Nova Group managing director Arto Merisalo now says?
     
Besides, the politicians were active themselves.
      Johannes Koromaa of the TT Foundation of the Confederation of Finnish Industry (EK) tells us that financial backing was divided up on the basis of requests from the parties..
      It is no good that the Centre Party now comes out and loudly declares it is being frank and open, if it is still trying to draw the discussion off into side-issues.
      The situation of the National Coalition Party and the Social Democrats is also not being helped in the least by the fact that they are currently keeping the precise sums of support under wraps, arguing that the law does not require complete disclosure.
     
A year ago, Matti Vanhanen said that the political system was in crisis because of the election financing scandal.
      What shreds of credibility does it have left if the hiding still goes on?
      On Monday both Jutta Urpilainen of the SDP and Jyrki Katainen of the National Coalition Party refused to say anything at all to Helsingin Sanomat on the subject of election financing.
     
Those politicians who grudgingly do take part in the discussion of campaign funding make sure to emphasise to us over and again that there is nothing illegal in the support.
      Correct, there is not, but that is not the real issue here.
      The key issue is whether there were attempts to conceal the support, and if so, then why - and have lies been told about the funding.
      Again, a year ago Vanhanen and Korhonen alike both responded to enquries very sparingly, splitting hairs or saying after the fact that they had answered the wrong question by mistake.
      Twelve months ago, Vanhanen "had no recollection" of having met the election financiers before the election itself - and now he remembers it quite clearly.
      What else is that but covering up?
     
The nub of the matter is also the issue of whether the covert support was part of an attempt to influence political decision-making.
      The givers of the money say this now quite openly.
      Arto Merisalo's comments (see article from 16.6.) reveal that the businessmen wanted to buy a government that they liked for the country.
      There is nothing intrinsically illegal in that, but why did they try to hush it up?
     
Helsingin Sanomat / First published in print 16.6.2009
     
     
The writer heads the Helsingin Sanomat political desk.


Previously in HS International Edition:
  TT Foundation backed at least Centre and National Coalition parties (16.6.2009)
  Centre Party gets extensive funding from business (16.6.2009)
  Vanhanen expects detailed report from Centre Party secretary on 2007 election funding (15.6.2009)
  Election financiers (20.5.2008)

See also:
  CEO of Nova Group claims Centre supports real estate company in zoning issue (30.5.2008)
  Prime Minister warns of political crisis stemming from election campaign money affair (21.5.2008)
  Brax wants monitoring of election campaign funding away from Ministry of Justice (19.5.2008)
  Members of Parliament revising campaign finance reports (16.5.2008)