Finland headed back to the polls on Sunday for a runoff vote in the country’s most high-stakes presidential election in a generation.
The former prime minister Alexander Stubb, of the centre-right National Coalition party, led in the polls but his rival Pekka Haavisto, a former foreign minister and a member of the Green party who is running as an independent, had narrowed the gap in the last few days of campaigning.
The winner will succeed the two-term president Sauli Niinistö, who oversaw his country’s accession to Nato. In the first-round ballot two weeks ago, Stubb and Haavisto won 27.2% and 25.8% of the votes respectively, leading a field of nine candidates including Jussi Halla-aho, of the far-right Finns party, who came third.
In the frantic final days of campaigning, the candidates’ personal lives and attitudes to nuclear weapons came into sharp focus. Haavisto, who would be the country’s first Green and first gay president, questioned why his sexuality had been in the spotlight in recent days.
The 65-year-old said he had been surprised by the way his sexuality had become an issue of public interest in the second and final round and said that journalists, particularly those from the national broadcaster Yle, had been “triggering” discussion around it.
On Sunday morning, Stubb, 55, said as he cast his vote in Espoo that he was “feeling good”. He said: “I’m sure I’ll get a few butterflies coming in about I’d say 7.55 in the evening tonight before we get the pre-vote at 8 o’clock, but feeling good.”
Nearly half (about 46%) of voters who were permitted to take part in early voting did so, according to official data. The first results from early voting are expected to be published soon after polls close at 8pm local time (6pm GMT). A final result is expected at about 11pm local time.
The Finnish president is the head of state and commander-in-chief of the army and responsible for foreign policy in cooperation with the government.
International security and defence have been a high priority for Finnish voters amid accusations of Moscow instigating a “hybrid operation” on Russia and Finland’s shared border, leading Finland to temporarily close the frontier in its entirety. Stubb has described foreign policy and security as “existential” issues for Finland.
As well as public debate of Haavisto’s sexuality, nuclear weapons were also a central topic. While Stubb is in favour of allowing nuclear weapons to be transported through the country, Haavisto, who previously worked as a UN peace negotiator, wants to maintain Finland’s nuclear weapons ban.
