Submitted by: Foreign Policy Decisive in Presidential Elections

While the government parties debate and accuse each other, it feels safe to have a president in the country who leads the foreign policy together with the government and the Riksdag. Our current president has done his job well but his term ends in half a year and the election campaign is now in full swing as most of the major candidates have been nominated.

In the past, the head of state had more or less power. It is the same today.

In the Federal Republic of Germany, like the monarchs of Sweden and Great Britain, the president has only representative and ceremonial duties; In Russia, China, and the United States, the president holds executive government power; In France, the president has decisive influence on the formation of the government and the government’s policy (as in Finland under our previous constitution).

Under our current constitution, the president directs foreign policy in conjunction with the government. The president is also the commander. However, the Prime Minister represents Finland in the EU.

In my opinion, Finland’s current constitution works well. It is good that the President has been able to lead us into NATO and directly manage important contacts with the President of the United States and other key figures, while maintaining the necessary contact with the Government and Parliament.

The president is directly elected by the people and our current president was well aware of the shift in public opinion from NATO negative to NATO positive when Russia launched its major offensive in Ukraine (I myself changed my opinion overnight). It also felt safe that the President had supreme command of the armed forces if Russia, which did not want our NATO membership, took military countermeasures against us!

From the above it should be clear that I consider the next presidential election as important and that we get a president who can guide our foreign policy. A presidential election is a personal election, where the personal qualities of the president are decisive, not the person’s party political background.

Ocean Swenson, Dusby