City Sámi becoming more assertive

Sámi Parliament elections concluded this week

Pirita Näkkäläjärvi

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By Jenni Leukumaavaara
     
      Pirita Näkkäläjärvi, who lives in Helsinki, which has been called Finland’s largest Sámi village, is afflicted with a major case of election fever. Näkkäläjrvi, who is originally from Inari in Finnish Lapland, is a candidate for the Sámi Parliament, running on a platform promoting the rights of Sámi who live outside the traditional areas of her people.
      “Issues of the migrant Sámi have been left up to the voluntary efforts of individual people in Oulu, Rovaniemi, and Helsinki. This is wrong, because more than half of all Sámi and 70 per cent of Sámi children live outside the Sámi regions”, she says.
     
Näkkäläjärvi feels that people in the north have not fully understood how serious the situation is. Meanwhile, interest in voting among the migrant Sámi is declining because the activities of the Sámi Parliament are not reflected in their everyday lives.
      Näkkäläjärvi would like to see improvements in the constitutionally guaranteed child daycare services in the Sámi language, and more places for migrant Sámi to meet. She feels that questions of Sámi identity should be planned for the coming 50 or 100 years, in order to keep up with change.
     
In Ivalo Pekka Pekkala, who has served two terms in the Sámi Parliament, sits in the kitchen of his green house. He sees the situation of the migrant Sámi from a different point of view. He feels that the Sámi who live outside the traditional Sámi areas want to turn those areas into a reservation where no actual activities, such as fishing or forestry, would be allowed any more.
      “I get the feeling that the other Sámi are not seen to be of any worth alongside the migrant Sámi. If they achieve a ruling position, there will be conflicts.”
      Pekkala feels that the balance in the outgoing Sámi Parliament is good, with four out of 20 members representing Sámi living outside the traditional areas.
     
One of the politicians of the younger generation, Petra Magga-Vars, who is running for a third term in the Sámi Parliament, also disagrees with the notion that the migrant Sámi are being shunned by the others.
      “Undoubtedly they have to fight more for their identity and their rights than we do. However, I feel that the Sámi Parliament has worked on their behalf as well, by calling for the establishment of a Sámi house in Helsinki, for instance.”
     
According to Magga-Vars, the Sámi Parliament wants to see all Sámi as equal, but points out that survival in the sparsely-populated areas is “quite an art”.
      “I think that it is important that those who still live here should get the support that they need.”
      Magga-Vars herself lives in Vuotso, on the southernmost edges of the Sámi area.
     
The electoral term of the Sámi Parliament, which is now coming to an end, has been fraught with conflict, sometimes to such a degree that Pekka Pekkala has questioned the need for having such a body at all.
      Pekkala, Näkkäläjärvi, and Magga-Vars all agree that new blood is needed.
      “I hope that young people would get into the Parliament. We old stalwarts aren’t up to making any reforms”, Pekkala says.
     
Many older figures are stepping down from the Parliament, and the number of young candidates increased.
      Expected winners in the elections are younger Sámi, who have become increasingly interested in their Sámi identity, their language, and their culture.
      The candidates also agree that without a language or culture, there is nothing else.
     
Helsingin Sanomat / First published in print 2.10.2011
     
Piritta Näkkäläjärvi, Pekka Pekkala, and Petra Magga-Vars were all elected to the Sámi Parliament.


Previously in HS International Edition:
  Lapland: disputes over land and reindeer pit brother against brother (4.3.2008)
  Many Finns still view the Sámi people as fairy tale characters (17.7.2001)

Links:
  Sámi Parliament
  Sami people (Wikipedia)

JENNI LEUKUMAAVAARA / Helsingin Sanomat