THROWN INTO DISARRAY by a Panama Papers scandal, Iceland’s coalition government appointed a new prime minister on Thursday, refusing to call early elections to resolve a crisis in public confidence brought about by the revelation that three senior ministers had secret offshore accounts.
Opinion polls suggest that the government would be trounced in any immediate election, and most likely replaced by Iceland’s branch of the Pirate Party, a pan-European movement founded in Sweden in 2006 to fight for internet freedom and direct democracy. The Icelandic branch currently holds just three seats in the nation’s parliament, the Althing.
BREAKING: Almost half of #Iceland would now vote for Pirate Party. https://t.co/CGgQudqExh #panamapapers @birgittaj pic.twitter.com/vewjGhPCjG
— Iceland Monitor (@IcelandMonitor) April 6, 2016
Iceland: Pirate Party way up in the polls pic.twitter.com/RNCuOX2x0h
— Eurasia Group (@EurasiaGroup) April 7, 2016
Protesters, who have massed outside the Althing in Reykjavik’s Austurvöllur square every day this week, have made it clear that they are not satisfied with just the bizarre resignation of Prime Minister Sigmundur Davíð Gunnlaugsson, who intends to keep his seat in parliament and remain in charge of his party despite officially ceding power to his deputy, Sigurður Ingi Jóhannesson.
4th day of protests#PanamaLeaks #Iceland pic.twitter.com/UWbJuMCzBJ
— Halldóra Mogensen (@Halldoramog) April 7, 2016
Opposition parties are also outraged that the finance minister, Bjarni Benediktsson, and the interior minister, Ólöf Nordal, have not resigned, despite also being named in the Panama Papers investigation as the holders of offshore accounts.
On social networks, Icelanders shared memes describing the slightest of reshuffles as merely a cosmetic change.
???????????? #cashljós #blesssimmi #panamapapers #þingrof #þingrofl #siðrof #siðrofl pic.twitter.com/9gQW7qzOyN
— Frank A. Bl. Cassata (@FrankCassata) April 7, 2016
#panamapapers #iceland #IcelandPM pic.twitter.com/lrYQdDEpgR
— hugleikur dagsson (@hugleikur) April 5, 2016
After Benediktsson spoke to the press on Wednesday night inside parliament, alongside the prime minister’s hand-picked replacement, Jóhannesson, one of the three Pirate representatives, Ásta Helgadóttir, expressed her indignation at the finance minister’s claim that the government had to stay in place because the opposition was “rubbish.”
That guy behind me called my party "rubbish he is also going to continue as finance minister #panamapapers #iceland pic.twitter.com/lCVzK7lv6M
— Ásta Helgadóttir (@asta_fish) April 6, 2016
Helgadóttir phoned The Intercept from the Althing a few minutes later to say that the reshuffle was “a farce” and the coalition’s plan to delay elections until an unspecified date in the autumn is “not what the people are asking for.” The current crisis, she added, demonstrates that the country needs the new constitution her party has promised to implement, “with some sort of mechanism” for more direct democracy and ways to ensure that “politicians have to listen to the people.”
Helgadóttir also said that while the party is still focused on issues related to the web, “This is all interconnected — internet freedom is about how to practice fundamental human rights in the 21st century, and democracy is one of those rights.”
Another of the Pirates in parliament is Birgitta Jónsdóttir, a free speech and digital rights activist who helped edit the WikiLeaks video “Collateral Murder,” and has led the effort to make Iceland a haven for whistleblowers.
Speaking to Democracy Now on Wednesday, Jónsdóttir pointed out that the Pirate Party has consistently led in the polls for the last year.
Gallup Poll; Pirate Party Iceland (Piratar). A year ago we had 8.7% now we have 35.9%. http://t.co/HNyt8czI9h TAKK pic.twitter.com/13gPCw1M02
— Birgitt? Jónsdóttir (@birgittaj) October 2, 2015
Writing on the party’s website, Helgadóttir, Jónsdóttir, and their colleague Helgi Hrafn Gunnarsson admitted on Thursday that they are “still surprised by the popularity of the party,” themselves. “It’s the big riddle we’re always trying to solve,” they wrote.
By way of an answer, they suggested that the population is ready for radical change:
The confidence of the Icelandic people we believe rests in us, not only because we are a party that has not been a part of government, but also we think it is because people sense that we stand for enacting changes that have to do with reforming the systems, rather than changing minor things that might easily be changed back. Our policies therefore stand in stark contrast to what appears to be the pattern of modern politics; minor changes but always the same dysfunctional system. We do not define ourselves as left or right but rather as a party that focuses on the systems. In other words, we consider ourselves hackers — so to speak — of our current outdated systems of government.
They added, “The Icelandic Pirate Party will not be able to solve all of the ingrown problems in Iceland, but it will certainly be able to offer new hardware, complete with a new set of rules based on how we operate as a collective community.”
When the Pirate Party’s surge in the polls started last year, then-Prime Minister Gunnlaugsson cast them as dangerous anarchists in an interview with Visir, a Reykjavik newspaper. “If general discontent led to a revolutionary party — a party with some very unclear ideas about democracy, and a party which wants to upheave the foundations of society — becoming influential, that would be cause for concern for society as a whole,” he said. “It would take society in a whole other direction, where it would be difficult to hang onto those values that we possess and have been building on for decades.”
Less than a week after that dire warning, the Pirates celebrated their first legislative success, leading an effort to repeal Iceland’s law against blasphemy.
The Pirates, along with three other opposition parties, introduced a motion of no confidence in the government Gunnlaugsson has left behind, to be debated on Friday. By then, popular anger is likely to have ratcheted up still further, following reports on Thursday that three bankers who were jailed last year for their part in the collapse of Iceland’s Kaupthing bank in 2008 were granted early release, as the result of a new law passed by the current government.
Three Kaupthing Bankers are being released from prison today after having served only 1 of their 4-5 years sentence #BreakingNews
— Arnaldur Sigurðarson (@Arnaldtor) April 7, 2016
America should have a Pirate Party. A party for the new generations to rewrite our constitution where democracy, rule of law and natural resources are for the people and not the elites! Congratultions Icelanders?
United States is dealing with their own undeclared pirate party, and the Krugman types keep pushing an empty narrative that sanders is over the edge, when their grip on the edge is what everyone plans to step on, between n o w and those dark days in November-
Extend the plank! To Davey Jones’ Locker with all of ye corrupt bilge rats.
Just like in the U.S., the establishment liars cons and thieves are in a state of panic.
Fantastic article Mr. Mackey, thank you for watching and following up on this.
Not sure where the Pirate Party would take Iceland, but perhaps it would be a much better place than financial collapse, backroom deals to get those that oversaw the collapse out of jail and all this other stuff. Amazing after everything the Icelander’s have been through it was already going off the rails (corruption), again, at this point.
the pirate party? perhaps a change we can believe in? david cay johnstone writes that 90% of the new lowe’s or home depot type stores building’s cost is paid by the taxpayer… the rich socialize the risks and privatize/pirate /steal the profits.
Our elites call democracy “the tyranny of the majority”; well, I’m sick of the self serving tyranny of the craven self serving elites. Out with the lot of you and be happy you are not hung for your crimes against the people. More direct democracy is needed yesterday; everyone is corruptible. We need some kind of power over the purveyors of propaganda, otherwise known as the media. Far too much of it is corporate with a self serving corporate agenda. Public TV in the USA is so poor it takes money from the Koch and just sold off Sesame Street to the hucksters at corporate HBO. High time for the people to be in charge, not the pigs. Why do you elites believe Hitler and the Communists were able to come to power? The people had, had enough and were amenable to the first bombastic demagogue who came along.
Fantastic piece. Secrets kill democracy and common ownership. Wealthy people and their secret stashes and secret deals and secret laws and meetings behind closed doors are strangling good social order. The “just trust us” crowd gave us iraq and wmd. Perhaps if Iceland writes laws that throws politician liars and wealthy thieves into prison, the u.s. might react…
The U.S. wouldn’t react, but I definitely know where I would be moving :)
The future of freedom is not here.
Remember those bankers we so successfully jailed? News report from earlier this morning: Three bankers jailed for their part in the failure of Icelandic bank Kaupthing wil “be released from Kvíabryggja prison today, … on account of a change to the law. They will instead move to a halfway house, Vernd, where they will have to return every night but will otherwise be free. A member of parliament has criticised the legislation (for) being “handcrafted” for these bankers.
Meanwhile, protests continue for the fourth consecutive day.
Thank you Mr Mackey for keeping this story from just becoming another social media meme.
I don’t know how the Pirate Party went from three seats to front-runner, but it fills me with a powerful and unfamiliar feeling. I think it’s called “hope”!
“Independence Party leader and Minister of Finance Bjarni Benediktsson has promised new elections this autumn, which would otherwise have gone ahead in summer 2017. It is believed the new government as a whole plans to honor this promise.”
Why is your headline so misleading? Where is this resistance to a new election you speak of sir? Are you saying justice can only be served if there is an immediate election? Wouldn’t that simply be your opinion?
No:
great update Kitt. Always good to know what bankster thieves are up to. Just a guess but i sense there are some con fed wallstreet pimp thieves trying to influence elections around that world. These thieves want to replace the voice of democracy with the propaganda produced by dollar power.
As we all know, that problem is about 2,016 years old.
The only reference to resisting elections is that one quote from one person.
Mackey and his headline writer should be fired so that both can focus on writing misleading blogs somewhere else. If the election actually gets delayed, fine write a story about that. Until then he is simply writing about a conspiracy theory.
Granted, that is my opinion…
“We’re the government, and we’re here to help!”
Charlethreee always believes that statement because Charliethreee knows that to question that statement could only come under the definition of “conspiracy theory.” And Charliethree doesn’t abide by any writers invoking anything that could remotely ever qualify as a “conspiracy theory.” Charliethree thinks anyone who does that, even though it is only his “opinion,” should all be fired.
Noted.
20 questions gambit; do knot feed-