Are we losing our Sámi Parliament? - How the Finns are destroying our cultural self-government
It is starting to look threateningly that Sanna Marin's government will be the third consecutive Finnish government to betray the Sámi people. The current Sámi Parliament Act violates human rights treaties binding Finland (e.g. cases CERD 59/2016, CCPR 2668/2015) and maintains supremacy of Finns even in Sámi internal affairs.
The reform of the Sámi Parliament Act is basically about whether Finns should decide about Sámi people's issues, or the Sámi people themselves. It is unfathomable how something that you would think is a perfectly clear matter has to be debated decade after decade.
The majority of the members of the Sámi Parliament, supported by the decisions of key human rights bodies, are of the view that the Sámi people themselves should define how we choose our political representatives amongst ourselves. This is part of the right of self-determination, the right which belongs to all nations and is a cornerstone of international law.
The unofficial opposition of the Sámi Parliament, the so-called “New Lapp movement”, is of the view that Finnish institutions (including the Supreme Administrative Court) should define who can vote and run for office in the Sámi Parliament’s elections. The opposition is already strong in the Sámi Parliament and they can seize power in the next elections, if the flaws in the electoral roll are not corrected and Finnish institutions accept more ethnic Finns (Sámi: láddelaččat/rivgut) into the electoral roll.
The opposition demands the preservation of the so-called Lappish tax clause in the Sámi Parliament Act. Tax books dating back to the 18th century prove the basis on which people paid taxes. The "Lappish tax" was paid by people who practised so-called Lapp livelihoods, such as hunting, reindeer husbandry, fishing and gathering. Those who paid this tax included both ethnic Finns and ethnic Sámi.
The representatives of the Sámi people have never accepted the Lapp tax clause into the law, because it enables ethnic Finns to apply for the Sámi parliament’s electoral roll. The opposition of the Parliament and the MPs of the Centre Party’s representatives from Lapland region demand that the Lappish tax clause remains in the law. Leaving the clause in the law would therefore mean accepting that ethnic Finns must also be able to apply for the electoral roll of the Sámi Parliament.
Sámi Parliament is the result of the Sámi's decades-long struggle to have an official representative body in Finland. The “New Lapp movement”, which has arisen in the hope of land rights, aims to water down the Sámi's still fragile cultural self-governance. It is about an existential threat to the legitimacy of the Sámi Parliament. The Sámi representative body would lose its meaning if the decision-making power was exercised by others than the Sámi.
The opposition's claims of discrimination are completely baseless. Different Sámi language groups are represented in the Sámi Parliament, e.g. two of the current vice-presidents belong to Inari Sámi families. The Skolt Sámi also have representatives at the Parliament, including in the executive board. There are no other Sami groups on the Finnish side of Sápmi. The opposition has not presented any objective criteria for defining the right to vote, which would not enable at least thousands of non-Sámi people being able to be admitted into the electoral roll.
It is impossible to enshrine in law a perfect definition of who is a Sámi. Extending the language-based criterion to the fourth generation is the compromise reached as a result of long negotiations. It would seem to be obvious that the descendants of ethnic Finns who paid the Lapp tax should not be included in the self-governing body of the Sámi people. Still, this debate keeps going decade after decade.
Reforming the Sámi Parliament Act is about much more than just the right to vote, the most important being strengthening the obligation to negotiate and updating the voting method to the 21st century. The most important role of the Sámi Parliament would still be to present the official position of the Sámi people. Sámi Parliament plays a significant role e.g. as a defender of traditional livelihoods. The loss of this support could significantly increase the threat of competing forms of land use in the Sámi region, which would also threaten biodiversity.
Marin's government has time until 17th of November to bring the Sámi Parliament Act to the Finnish Parliament. The question is ultimately whether the Sámi should have an official representative body in Finland or not. Well should we? Why does this still have to be asked in the year 2022?
