Pekka Haavisto is not your typical DJ. He’s also Finland’s former minister for foreign affairs.
And there’s a massive chance he’ll be elected president next month.
Former Prime Minister Alexander Stubb won the first round of the presidential election, advancing to a runoff election with Haavisto. The margin between the two candidates was tiny; by removing the seven other candidates from the race, the election is effectively a tossup.
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“You could see that people could never imagine that gay men could be elected. But this has been changing,” he said during one of his characteristic campaign events. The rallies feature popular musicians and a set by the 65-year-old that features his favorite songs from the 60s and 70s. He performs under the name DJ Pexi.
The politician grabs the mic between songs to tell his young supporters why the songs are important to him. And while he says the events have been “a successful concept,” he admits that he’s befuddled why students would pay to dance to his DJ sets of songs performed decades before they were born.
Plus, as his husband has admitted to the media, Haavisto’s musical taste is “terrible.”
A former UN diplomat, Haavisto is a member of the Green League Party. He is running as an independent candidate. Stubb is from the rightwing National Coalition Party.
“Actually, when people said in the beginning, ‘This is very boring, four or five very similar men,’ I don’t find any similarities,” he said. “We maybe look like men from the same age category but we have very different experiences, very different stories, very different views. People can really choose between very fundamentally different alternatives.”
Elected for six years, Finland’s president is more like the president of the United States than other European countries. The president is the military commander and holds executive power over foreign and security policy.
After the country abandoned years of studied neutrality and joined NATO, it is now effectively a frontline defense against Russian aggression. Haavisto’s career as a diplomat and knowledge of international affairs gives him an edge in the election. He negotiated the country’s entrance into the military alliance.