Sauli Väinämö Niinistö (born August 24, 1948, Salo, Finland) is the Speaker of the Parliament of Finland and the President of the Football Association of Finland.[1][2] A lawyer by training, he is a former Minister of Finance and was the National Coalition Party candidate in the 2006 presidential election.
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Niinistö ran his own law firm in Salo, before entering national politics.
Niinistö served on the municipal council of Salo from 1977–92 and was elected a Member of the Finnish Parliament (Eduskunta) from the district of Finland Proper in 1987. In 1994 he was chosen to lead the National Coalition Party as the party chairman and subsequently became Justice Minister in Prime Minister Paavo Lipponen's first cabinet in 1995 [3].
Switching portfolios, Niinistö became Finance Minister in 1996, a place he held also in Lipponen's second cabinet from 1999–2003. In both cabinets, the right wing Niinistö was deputy to social democrat Lipponen, thus enabling the use of the term rainbow government in reference to Lipponen's two consecutive cabinets. As Finance Minister Niinistö was known for his strict fiscal policy as well as his hobby of roller skating.
A charismatic figure, Niinistö was urged by his party to stand for president in the the elections of 2000, but he refused.
Niinistö announced his gradual retirement from politics in 2001, a course of action he has not completely followed to date. He was succeeded that year by Ville Itälä as party leader. Upon the end of his term as a cabinet minister in 2003, Niinistö went on to become vice-chairman of the Board of Directors at the European Investment Bank.
In March 2005, Niinistö announced his candidacy for the Finnish Presidency. He represented the National Coalition Party, challenging the incumbent President Tarja Halonen. He qualified for the second round runoff (as one of the top two candidates in the first round), held on 29 January 2006, but was defeated by Tarja Halonen.
In 2006 Niinistö announced that he was standing again for the Finnish parliamentary election. He said, however, that he had no plans to take any high-ranking political job like the prime ministership in the future. [4] He received 60,498 personal votes in the 2007 elections[5], which is a record number of votes for one candidate in a Finnish parliamentary election.
After the election Niinistö decided to take the respected position of the Speaker of the Parliament. Niinistö is also Honorary President of the European People's Party (EPP) after successfully negotiating the merger of the European Democrat Union (EDU) into the EPP in 2002.
Niinistö was elected as the President of the Football Association of Finland on November 8, 2009[2], he replaces Pekka Hämäläinen who worked twelve years since 1997 for Suomen Palloliitto.[6]
While a cabinet minister, Niinistö, a widower, became romantically involved with opposition MP Tanja Karpela, a former beauty queen and later Minister of Culture. Karpela's Centre Party was in opposition and Niinistö was considered the second-most influential man in government. Under close press scrutiny ever since, in 2003 Karpela and Niinistö announced their engagement, which was however called off in 2004.
Niinistö married Jenni Haukio in January 2009.[7]
Niinistö is the uncle of Ville Niinistö, a Green League MP from Turku.
In Finland, Niinistö is also remembered as one of the survivors of the 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake. He escaped the following tsunami by climbing up a lamppost with his two sons in Khao Lak.
| Political offices | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by Anneli Jäätteenmäki |
Minister of Justice
(Finland) 1995–1996 |
Succeeded by Kari Häkämies |
| Preceded by Pertti Salolainen |
Deputy
Prime Minister (Finland) 1995–2001 |
Succeeded by Ville Itälä |
| Preceded by Iiro Viinanen |
Minister of Finance
(Finland) 1996–2003 |
Succeeded by Antti Kalliomäki |
| Preceded by Timo Kalli |
Speaker of the
Parliament of Finland 2007–present |
Succeeded by (incumbent) |
|
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