Seven Star Movement
Seven Star Movement (, ) is a Finnish political party founded in 2018. The party was founded by Paavo Väyrynen, its president and only MP, after he was ousted from his previous party, Citizens' Party. History. Paavo Väyrynen had successfully run for the Finnish Parliament in the 2015 Finnish parliamentary election, representing the Centre Party. Väyrynen, however, chose to forfeit his seat in order to serve in the European Parliament that he had entered earlier. Väyrynen returned to the Finnish Parliament in June 2018, but defected from the Centre Party to the Citizens' Party, which he had founded. The  Citizens' Party was already engulfed in a power struggle at that time, which resulted in Väyrynen's ousting In late June, Väyrynen announced that he had founded the Seven Star Movement as a substitute for Citizens' Party, with which he remained in the parliament for a time. The name is inspired by the Italian Five Star Movement. The Seven Star Movement's goals are political independence, non-alignment, and greater immigration control. A trial court ruled in November 2018 that Väyrynen's ousting had been illegal. Despite the ruling, the legal struggle convinced Väyrynen to go forward with his Seven  Star Movement rather than the Citizens' Party. Later that month, Väyrynen announced that he had officially aligned himself with the , and therefore became their first MP. Väyrynen is the president of the party. The secretary is Seppo Hauta-aho, Väyrynen's former campaign aide. The party is based in Helsinki. The movement gathered 5,000 by December 2018 and was admitted to the on 21 December 2018. The party took part in the 2019 parliamentary election, but failed to get a single seat in the parliament. After the election, Väyrynen wrote in his blog that the party would continue its operations . Although initially skeptical about the party taking part in the 2019 European Parliament election, they decided to run. Among the candidates are Väyrynen and businessman .