Halla-Aho receives record donations

Helsingin Sanomat reported today blogger and popular racist Jussi Halla-Aho has received a record sum of donations for his parliamentary election campaign. Halla-Aho received over €60,000, overtaking previous record holder Sauli Niinistö(pbuh) who gathered over €57,000 for his 2007 campaign. Halla-Aho as we all know is a highly respected member of the Korkeasaari Zoo board of directors, while Sauli Niinistö is a former minister and a speaker of Parliament.

"spare some change, pal?"

Halla-Aho received 931 separate donations, with the average being €66 and the largest individual donation standing at €2000. Interestingly, Niinistö received fewer, but considerably larger donations in 2007 with sums ranging from €2000 to €12,000.

One should not be too hasty in drawing conclusions from this, since Finland has no real established political donation culture. It is more than likely that these microdonations are an American import, inspired by the United States Ron Paul and Barack Obama campaigns. I say likely, but there has been a publicised attempt to outright copy the Ron Paul "money bomb" campaign in one of the more active forums of the Finnish anti-immigration scene.