True Finns’ Timo Soini tired of accusations of racism

Timo Soini

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MP Timo Soini, chairman of the True Finns party, is thoroughly fed up. On the previous day he had declared in front of Parliament that he is not a racist in any shape or form.
     “Once and for all.”
     He says he is tired of having to repeat at every turn how opposed he is to racism. “It reminds me of the question ‘have you stopped beating your wife?’ I always have to repeat this same thing. Sometimes you get tired of this.”
     
In the morning Soini was impressed to read about the refusal by MP Oras Tynkkynen to seek the chairmanship of the Green League.
     He asks what sane person would want a job like this, speculating that a psychopath or idiot might be good for this job. “A psychopath doesn’t care, and an idiot doesn’t understand”, he says with his idiosyncratic laugh that sets his entire body vibrating.
     
Soini does not usually complain, but now the man is in anguish. He says that he has to explain all kinds of “Facebooks from Urjala” (see link below). He adds: “Nobody can catch Timo Soini for what he says, but I am called to account for everything that everyone else says.
     On the issue of immigration policy, he says that he is pleased that the large government parties wanted the support of the True Finns for amendments to the law on foreigners. He puts the tips of his forefinger and thumb a centimetre apart from each other; this is how close they were to reaching unanimity.
     
Soini feels that asylum policy will be open to too much interpretation under the proposed law.
      He has nothing against allowing asylum seekers to work.
      “We have always wanted them to work and pay taxes. Colour has nothing to do with it.”
      He also says that he has come to know asylum seekers and immigrants.
      “I’ve knelt quite a bit alongside Poles and other immigrants in church.”
      Timo Soini is a member of the Finnish Catholic Church. “And the churchgoers do not think that I’m a racist.”
     
“How can I be permitted to talk about immigration policy. It has to be possible to criticise it without being labelled a racist. After all a person who wants changes in fishing regulations does not get labelled anti-fishing.”
      The subject turns to his party’s growing support figures in opinion polls. Soini is certain that if the True Finns had the support of only two per cent of the population, people would leave him alone. However, with eight per cent supporting his party, he has become an opponent worth attacking.


Previously in HS International Edition:
  Rami Sipilä does not like Somalis (15.2.2008)
  Green women’s organisation considers filing criminal report against True Finns councillor Jussi Halla-aho (14.11.2008)
  Soini defends True Finns party against accusations of xenophobia (9.10.2008)

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