The Feminist Party has officially launched its 2019 election manifesto, unveiling 100 initiatives on equality.
It’s the first general election campaign for the party, which enjoyed breakthrough success at the 2017 local elections, winning a seat on the Helsinki City Council.
In April, they’re joining forces with the Pirate Party, Liberal Party and Animal Justice Party to form an election alliance and try to get enough votes in the capital city region to secure at least one seat in parliament.
In practice that means the candidate with the most votes overall – no matter which party they are from – would become the member of parliament.
100 equality initiatives
At today’s launch event, the party said that equality must be seen as a starting point for all policies, and not just a special issue. They highlighted their most important objectives as human security, including issues around immigration; non-discrimination and the prevention of climate change.
“The program is an ambitious target that presents a vision of what kind of society we should build in the next four years” says party chair Katju Aro.
The Feminist Party would plan to ease legislation on immigration and asylum seekers, increase free movement and welcome thousands more quota refugees to Finland. They also want to present their own plans around basic income and military service, and equalize economic policies.
“The next four years will be critical for the future of mankind. Europe is becoming increasingly politically divided while we should jointly tackle the large-scale problems such as climate change and protect the human security of both people who are already here, and those who are coming” says Aro.
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The party says it wants to build a country where everyone, regardless of colour, gender, sexual orientation or ability to work, has the opportunity to be “fully equal with others”.
“With this election programme, we want to give a voice to those groups of people who are too often put aside in decision-making. Our goal is to reform the political debate and challenge traditional ways of doing politics” says the Feminist Party’s Anna Jensen.
Although the Feminist Party plans to participate with candidates in all constituencies, analysts say their best chance of a seat in parliament is in Helsinki, in cooperation with the three other smaller parties.
