People joked that look at Finnish policy was about as interesting as watching paint dry.
Up to now.
Then of the general elections last weekend, the nationalist and true Finn party populist from political obscurity after having campaigned largely on the evils of the European Union and of its bailout of the Greece and the Ireland. He claimed 39 seats in the Parliament of Finland - almost eight times the number won the elections in 2007 - and it is likely to become a partner in a coalition Government.
Elections have led the ruling centre party and left this small prosperous country reeling. Finns gather in bars and cafés are dissecting the race, trying to take the measure of what is called "protest votes" and what it may mean for their future.
The Finland is not alone. Parties Union and anti-European anti-immigration were rising in Sweden, Italy, Hungary and the Netherlands last year, and more may follow. It is a disturbing trend for supporters of the union and efforts to preserve the euro by offering loans of emergency for nations members the weaker and more coordinated budget and expenditure policies in countries that use it.
Financial rescue plan requires unanimous approval of all members of the euro area, and it is feared that if the Finland back others may follow.
"One of the dangers that if a country quite important as the Finland decides to withdraw, the mechanism of support package for the euro could unravel, said Fredrik Erixon, the Director of the European Centre of international political economy, in Brussels." There are opinions anti-European and parties not only in Finland, but across Europe, display of hostility to the use of taxpayers ' money to help neighbors in need. ?
The question hangs on the horse trade which began in the formation of a new coalition Government. Just as the true Finns and their jovial leader, Timo Soini, grow an antibailout agenda, Europe envisages other rescue plan - this time for the Portugal.
It is unlikely that the Finnish vote will be jostling or even delay the Portuguese package, although it could lead to certain times nervous. Usually, it takes approximately a month to build a coalition Government in Finland, and which is sometimes when political parties only are not as far as they do today.
This week, outgoing Prime Minister, Mari Kiviniemi, refused to submit the question of rescue, the Parliament by saying that it was again Government. At the same time, Olli Rehn, Commissioner for economic and monetary European Union Affairs, has been cited in the edition of the Thursday of the Finnish daily Helsingin Sanomat as saying that the Finland had to take a position on Portuguese aid by 25 may at the latest.
The new Government should include the National Coalition of center-right party, the leftist Social Democratic Party and true Finns. The parties do not agree on issues such as the rescue plan, tax reform and the increase in the retirement age.
Mr Soini (pronounced knee, soy) has toned down his words in the last days, even if it is not known how far it will be compromised. He does not speak to the media except to the complaining about the coverage of his party. But during the campaign, Mr Soini - which is 48 and has been active in politics since he was 17 - repeatedly lashed out of the European Union. (He is fond of calling it "the heart of darkness".) A true democracy, he said, is "only possible in different States".
He also sold himself as a man of the people which is sensitive to the needs of the poor and working class at a time when the distance between the rich and the poor is growing and the Finland, like many other European countriesplans of austerity measures.
"Soini speaks a plain language with ordinary words," said city Pernaa, Director of the Centre for parliamentary studies at the University of Turku in Finland. "He told voters that they were wasting money paying for the debts of others.". Why they will pay for that when we need more doctors in small towns of Finland? ?
Perttu Pouttu, a former worker for a Helsinki energy company that responds to friends on most mornings Hakaniemi market square, said he had voted for the true Finns because the arguments of Mr Soini makes sense for him.
"Of course the rescue raises questions," he said. "We will communicate this money?". Where are the banks? It's their problem. ?
At the same time, Mr. Pouttu said he worried that the Finland had admitted too many refugees. "It does not affect me personally," he said. "But it bugs me that, by law, we have to give them apartments." When I took his retirement, nobody has given me an apartment. ?
The two issues - the European Union and immigration - are increasingly linked across Europe. "The draw overwhelming portions as the true Finns is the feeling among some Europeans, that they lose control of their destiny and that their nations would lose their identity," said Magali Balent, expert on European policy at the Robert Schuman Foundation in Paris.
But few analysts here believe that Mr Soini has any choice but to compromise on the rescue plan. Even if the Finland did not act, officials of the European Union stated that they could keep the rescue plan on the trail of complex technical manoeuvres.
Mr Rehn, Commissioner for economic and monetary European Union Affairs, encouraged the Finnish legislators to consider the interests of the country's long-term, taking into account of what might happen, say, when the bloc takes over farm subsidies.
In the European media, especially in Sweden, the true Finns came under fire as racist right. Minister of Foreign Affairs, Alexander Stubb and other have defended Mr Soini of such charges, although the other members of his party were more radical positions on immigration.
"Timo Soini is in reality a very civilized guy," said Lasse Lehtinen, journalist and Social Democrat who is a former member of the European Parliament. "It reads many." "It think much".
Mr. Lehtinen, like others, said that Mr. Soini received in the last election of quiet sadness on many fronts.
"I know a lady who voted for the true Finns because she was taunted to see a ROM begging in the street," he said. "She said no one had been begging on the streets since the 1940s, and she did not like it.".
Suzanne Daley reported Helsinki and James Kanter Brussels.
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