The travails of Prime Minister Vanhanen
COLUMN
Matti Vanhanen
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By Juha Akkanen
I actually feel sorry for Matti Vanhanen The man is too good to be the Prime Minister - at least with respect to the everyday issues of the government.
The government partners have nothing ill to say of the conciliatory Prime Minister. There is more negative commentary from his own sourpusses, who are ready to fight, if for no other reason than to stay warm.
On the basis of the evidence of the past nearly three years, it is nevertheless starting to feel that Vanhanen could not have become Prime Minister in any manner other than what happened: someone had to be found to replace Anneli Jäätteenmäki.
The Presidential election campaign showed it again. Vanhanen lacks the charisma, fire, and the ability to get people excited.
In small circles he is a good listener. He is clear in what he says and occasionally he is even a fluent conversationalist, even though he is no comic wit. However, in situations in which he has to perform, we see a dry lecturer who reads monotonously from papers. It is as if the centre-left government had a civil servant as its Prime Minister.
In less than a year, Vanhanen's public image as a calm and secure family man has collapsed completely.
The only way that his image could sink any further would be if he were found in questionable circumstances dressed in women's underwear with an orange in his mouth and a plastic bag on his head.
It makes no difference whom the Prime Minister dates, as long as he takes care of his work. However, in social interaction Vanhanen could learn something from some more experienced fellow party member - as long as it is not Paavo Väyrynen. Now the Prime Minister is behaving like an adolescent kid with the girls.
It would be best to warn the Prime Minister that wooing women by e-mail does not work any better than an SMS message.
Telecommunications operators and IT wizards could develop a new service: a message that self-destructs in half a minute after it is opened. It would save many men from embarrassment. Copying or forwarding the message would naturally be made impossible.
Vanhanen has one significant advantage on his side. As I recall, he was chosen the sexiest man in Finland in a vote arranged by a women's magazine.
I believe that the same happened with Paavo Lipponen when he was Prime Minister. In that case, others who want to will be able to do it as well. Sorry, Eero Heinäluoma, next spring it's MY turn.
If power can make a big grouch sexy, why couldn't it do the same for a slightly smaller grouch?
Here in the south, which is supposedly hostile to the Centre Party, people laugh at Vanhanen's antics. How would it be in the smaller cores of the Centre Party, in Ostrobothnia? After all, people don't laugh very much in that part of the country anyway.
If nothing else helps, Vanhanen might pull a Berlusconi and promise to remain celibate until the election.
This would be a greater sacrifice for him than for the 69-year-old Silvio Berlusconi.
Although it seems that Berlusconi has modified his words already - the one time that what he said might have sounded credible.
Helsingin Sanomat / First published in print 6.4.2006
JUHA AKKANEN / Helsingin Sanomat
juha.akkanen@hs.fi
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| 11.4.2006 - THIS WEEK |
 The travails of Prime Minister Vanhanen |
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