Elections to 295 municipal councils today

Elections to 295 municipal councils in the country except those in the Åland region will be held on Sunday.

Total 4,391,558 voters comprising 2,143,986 males and 2,247,572 females will choose their representatives to the municipal councils through the ballot scheduled for 9.00am to 8.00pm. In the mean time, 1,169,712 or 26.6 per cent of the voters have already cast votes in advance on March 29 to April 4, official sources said.

Fifteen political parties and constituency associations have nominated 33,618 candidates to the polls, with 805 carrying constituency association tickets. The number of contestants, however, is 3,506 or 9.4 per cent lower than that in the previous municipal elections.

Of the candidates 20,207 are men and 13,411 women, of whom 6,669 are currently serving on municipal councils, 162 are members of parliament, and four members of the European Parliament.

The ruling Suomen Keskusta (Centre Party) has nominated the highest number of 7,461 candidates, followed by the main opposition Suomen Sosialidemokraattinen Puolue (Social Democratic Party of Finland-SDP) nominating 6,132, Kansallinen Kokoomus (National Coalition Party) 5,739, Perussuomalaiset (Finns Party) 3,831, Vasemmistoliitto (Left Alliance) 3,203, and VihreäLiitö (Green League) 2,600.

The least number of 15 candidates was nominated by the Animal Justice Party of Finland.

Of the contestants 92.2 per cent are Finnish or Sami speakers, 5.6 per cent Swedish speakers, and 2.2 per cent have some other native languages.

Among the parliamentary parties, the Green League (4.2%), the Christian Democrats (3.5%) and the Swedish People’s Party (3.3%) have the most foreign language-speaking candidates in relative terms.

Based on occupations, 68.2 per cent of the candidates are employed, 8.4 per cent unemployed, and 23.4 per cent belong to the inactive population.

The results will be published for the first time on the election day after the voting closes at 8.00 pm. The results will be updated every five minutes as the preliminary counting proceeds. Information on the elected, the votes gained by the parties and by each candidate will be found on the same page for the whole country and by municipality and polling area.

The preliminary results for the elections will be ready for publication on the evening of election day and the final results by April 12 Wednesday.