Finland's Orpo under fire over €35M arena funding deal

Finnish Prime Minister Petteri Orpo is facing mounting pressure from political opponents and the media to appear before a recalled parliament to answer questions about his role in a controversial state financing deal, Report informs via Euractiv.

The row has dominated Finland's summer political agenda, with Orpo remaining largely absent from public scrutiny while on holiday.

His political foes sense an opportunity with less than a year to go before parliamentary elections, while a new poll revealed that the public considers Orpo the least successful Finnish prime minister in recent history.

The controversy centres around €35 million in conditional state aid promised to the 'Helsinki Garden' project, a long-gestating plan to shoehorn a new arena for sports and concerts into the city's downtown area, near the existing Olympic Stadium.

The project is led by Jan Vapaavuori, a former Helsinki mayor, economy minister, and vice-president of the European Investment Bank. He is also a member of Orpo's centre-right National Coalition Party.

Initially, Helsinki Garden applied for a €110 million state loan guarantee from the Ministry of Finance, but Finnish media obtained internal documents showing ministry officials considered the project a risky investment, citing possible cost and time overruns and the existence of similar arena projects nearby.

However, it was reported that Vapaavuori continued to lobby senior officials and politicians, including Orpo, before the €35 million support package was agreed. Vapaavuori also failed to record his contacts with ministers and officials in the lobbying transparency register, though he has since said he will update it.

The prime minister has denied that party or personal connections played any role in securing the €35 million commitment. But in Finland, which ranks second in Transparency International's Corruption Perceptions Index, even the appearance of impropriety attracts intense scrutiny.