Former Perussuomalaiset (PS)* deputy councilman for Helsinki, Olli Sademies, who suggested last year on Facebook that Africans should be forcibly castrated will be charged for ethnic agitation, according to Helsingin Sanomat, Finland’s largest-circulating daily.
Sademies, who is a retired policeman, was sacked from the PS in September.
Read the full story (in Finnish) here.
The former PS local politician denied any wrongdoing and claimed he was innocent.
“Freedom of speech and expression also includes saying things that may even upset some population groups,” he was quoted as saying in Helsingin Sanomat. “I hope that the district court [of Helsinki] acquaints itself with the decisions made by the European Court of Human Rights on this matter.”
During 2009-2014, only 27 people have been sentenced for ethnic agitation, according to MTV, which cites Statistics Finland.
The greatest number of sentences for ethnic agitation were given in 2012, which was 12.
Ever wonder how people like Sademies were ever accepted in the police service and the PS?
It says a lot about how much denial there is in Finland about racism.
* The Finnish name for the Finns Party is the Perussuomalaiset (PS). The English names of the party adopted by the PS, like True Finns or Finns Party, promote in our opinion nativist nationalism and xenophobia. We, therefore, prefer to use the Finnish name of the party on our postings. The direct translation of “Perussuomalaiset” is “basic” or “fundamental Finn.”