Democracy ambassadors to support participation of immigrants
From August till October, immigrants are provided with training on political rights, opportunities for participation and municipal elections in different parts of Finland.
Together with the Advisory Board for Ethnic Relations (ETNO), the Ministry of Justice organises regional events where so called democracy ambassadors are trained. Their task is to spread information about elections within their organisations and networks. The aim is to reach different population groups and spread information about participation with the help of the ambassadors who represent different nationalities.
The training events will be held in Helsinki, Lahti, Tampere, Jyväskylä, Kuopio and Oulu. Some of the events include a panel where local political parties present themselves to immigrants.
Up to now, the voting turnout as well as other forms of political participation and organisational activity have been fairly low among immigrants. Approximately every fifth foreigner entitled to vote voted in the previous municipal elections.
Information about the municipal elections is available in twenty different languages in the Elections website of the Ministry of Justice. In addition to Finnish, Swedish, the Saami languages and Romani, the languages include Albanian, Arabic, Chinese, English, Estonian, French, German, Kurdish (Soranî), Russian, Somali, Spanish, Thai, Turkish and Vietnamese.
Further information:
Senior Planning Officer Niklas Wilhelmsson, tel. 02951 50348
E-mail: [email protected]
Information about the municipal elections in different languages