Reykjavík Grapevine - 06.01.2012, Blaðsíða 10

10
The Reykjavík Grapevine
Issue 1 — 2012
fines. The remaining five were found
not guilty. Andri received his sentence
for allegedly biting a police officer and
pushing a security guard, while Þór's
sentence was for holding the door of
parliament open.
THE FORMER-pM TRIAL
Equally farcical as the Reykjavík Nine
trial, albeit in a different way, former
Prime Minister Geir H. Haarde was of-
ficially charged with negligence and
mismanagement for his part in contrib-
uting to the collapse of the Icelandic
economy. The parliamentary vote to
charge Geir was close—33 votes to 30—
and Geir professed his innocence many
times, stating that he was the victim of
both a global recession and being kept
deliberately in the dark by the Central
Bank. Going on the offensive, he called
the trial “political persecution” and a
“vendetta” initiated by former political
opponents.
While the latest Gallup poll on the
matter shows most Icelanders are
against the trial, it continues to wear
on. However, a proposal from the In-
dependence Party—from which Geir
hails—that has called for the trial to end
has seen support from members of the
ruling coalition. At the time of writing,
it is still uncertain if the trial even has a
future, let alone if a conviction will re-
sult.
CONSTITUTIONAL COMMITTEE
FORMED
One of the more exciting consequences
of the Pots and Pans Revolution was
the notion that we should re-write our
constitution—probably a good idea, as
the one we have now is more or less a
copy/paste job of the Danish one from
nearly a century ago. The idea was that
the people in charge of writing the new
constitution would be regular folks like
you and me, who were not in office.
A lot of well-known Icelanders were
voted in, but then complaints were
filed which challenged the legality
of the elections. The Supreme Court
found the numerous election laws were
broken, and so the election itself was
ruled invalid. The office of the Prime
Minister wasn’t daunted, and last Feb-
ruary, decided that they would simply
appoint those who won the election to
the position of being on the committee.
While the committee has been toying
with a number of proposed changes
to the constitution, soliciting sugges-
tions from the general public, an actual
brand new constitution is still a ways
away.
GEOTHERMAL ACTIVITY
Where Eyjafjallajökull was the star
of 2010, two volcanic events marked
this year—Grímsvötn and Vatnajökull,
within about two months of each other.
Last May, Grímsvötn erupted, sending
heavy plumes of ash across south Ice-
land, a great deal of it even making its
way west to Reykjavík, with the plume
reaching a maximum height of about
20km and reaching as far afield as
central Russia. No deaths, injuries, or
severe destruction of property and live-
stock were reported, although the ash
did take a long time to clean up.
Two months later, a minor volcanic
disturbance under the Vatnjökull gla-
cier caused a flash flood, which wiped
out a bridge in south Iceland. As this
happened during the height of the tour-
ist season, there were worries that we
would see a repeat of 2010, when the
Eyjafjallajökull eruption put a dent in
the tourist industry, one of Iceland’s
more lucrative sources of revenue.
However, quick-working civil engineers
managed to get the bridge repaired in
an astonishing two weeks. Again, no
deaths or injuries were reported. In
your face, Earth!
HUANG NUBO
If Magma Energy was the shady foreign
investor of 2010, Huang Nubo must
surely define 2011. A Chinese investor
who has worked in the tourist industry
both at home and broad, he also has a
reputed love of Iceland. And plenty of
well-connected links to the country,
too: he’s good friends with Hjörleifur
Sveinbjörnsson, the husband of for-
mer Foreign Minister Ingibjörg Sólrún
Gísladóttir. Huang Nubo and Hjörleifur
have apparently been friends for a long
time, and it has been reported that dur-
ing a visit to Iceland last year, Foreign
Minister Össur Skarphéðinsson lent
him a ministry car to be shown around
the country.
Last August, Huang said he was
interested in buying the northeast Ice-
landic farm Grímsstaðir á Fjöllum, for
the purpose of building a luxury hotel
and golf course there. This resulted in
a great public backlash, with plenty of
people sceptical of his intentions and
business practices. In the end, the Min-
ister of the Interior denied his request
to be granted an exception to Icelandic
law, which forbids non-Scandinavians
from buying land. It is reported that
Huang could be looking for other ways
to invest in Iceland’s tourist industry,
but for now it seems his interest in the
country has waned.
LAST MONTH, LEADERSHIp
CHANGES
December was a big month for chang-
es in Icelandic leadership. First off,
Bishop of Iceland Karl Sigurbjörns-
son announced that he would not run
again for the position of bishop, and
that early elections for the post would
be held. Throughout the year, there
had been calls for him to step down in
light of the church investigation find-
ings that he hid evidence implicating
a previous bishop who had commit-
ted sexual abuse against, among other
people, his own daughter. Karl refused
to step down and maintained that he
was innocent of any wrongdoing, but
his decision to not run again and hold
early elections may indicate a change
of heart.
Government ministries once again
combined, this time forming nine in
total, most of them run by women—
an Icelandic first. The ministries of
Fisheries, Agriculture, Business and
the Economy—as well as parts of the
Ministry of Industry—combined into a
new ministry, the Ministry of Employ-
ment, which is headed by Leftist-Green
chair Steingrímur J. Sigfússon. Oddný
Harðardóttir took over as Minister of
Finance, and the Ministry for the En-
vironment and the Ministry of Industry
combined to form the Ministry of the
Environment and Natural Resources.
However, this meant that now-former
Minister of Economics and Business
Árni Páll Árnason and Minister of Fish-
eries and Agriculture Jón Bjarnason
lost their posts.
On the very first day of 2012—cap-
ping off 2011 in classic style—President
Ólafur Ragnar Grímsson addressed the
nation, saying that he did not believe
he would run for another term, saying
that to leave would give him the free-
dom to speak more freely and focus
more on issues dear to his heart. This
would bring to an end 16 years in of-
fice, and would certainly be a fine time
to depart: much of 2011 has involved
the president in one way or the other,
so perhaps he wants to end his career
on a high note. But as his statement has
been considered open-ended, he might
end up running for office after all. Only
2012 will tell for sure.
Opinion | Paul Fontaine
On To Greener pastures, Hopefully
36.6 Average age of Icelanders. Up from 36.4 in 2010.
rvkgrapevine Reykjavík Grapevine
Former PM Geir Haarde claims he 'saved' Iceland's
economy. Is this plausible
07/04/2011
rvkgrapevine Reykjavík Grapevine
So that flood was no eruption! YOU HEAR THAT IN-
TERNATIONAL MEDIA, NOT AN ERUPTION
07/11/2011
rvkgrapevine Reykjavík Grapevine
Who is Huang Nubo and why does he want to buy
himself a piece of Iceland
09/01/2011
rvkgrapevine Reykjavík Grapevine
Bishop of Iceland to step down, sort of: "I am not quit-
ting, but will definitely resign at peace with God and..
11/14/2011
rvkgrapevine Reykjavík Grapevine
Is fisheries minister Jón Bjarnason on his way out
11/30/2011
rvkgrapevine Reykjavík Grapevine
Oh great. ICESAVE IS BACK. Whooo!
22 days ago
If 2011 taught me any-
thing about politics in this
country, it’s to take noth-
ing for granted, and that
it’s not easy being green—but it’s super
easy to say you are.
Take Icesave for example. When
the Landsbanki resolution committee
made their first payment to the UK
and Holland, I breathed a sigh of relief.
Finally, I thought, we can at last stop
hearing about Icesave, people can stop
arguing about Icesave, and I can stop
writing about Icesave. We’ve done our
bit now, right?
Nope! We may have wanted to move
on, but the European Free Trade Asso-
ciation (EFTA) certainly didn’t forget
the whole reason this thing started in
the first place—former Minister of
Finance Árni Mathiesen letting Ice-
landers, but not foreigners, withdraw
their money from Landsbanki. Appar-
ently it’s against international law and
violates our treaty with EFTA or some-
thing to discriminate so blatantly like
that, and still makes people upset even
three years after the fact. Touché!
At the same time, I honestly believed
that the dioxin scare was going to snow-
ball into something greater. I hoped
that discovering that burning our trash
puts toxins in our soil and food, would
lead to our government taking environ-
mentalism more seriously. I mean, one
of the parties in the coalition govern-
ment is called the Leftist-Greens. En-
vironmentalism is sort of a major part
of their whole raison d'être, and they’re
in charge of the Ministry for the Envi-
ronment. So what was the response?
Temporary incinerator closings, some
scaled back trash-burning hours, and
that’s pretty much it.
Should I be surprised though?
These are the same “environmental-
ists” who don’t seem to be in a hurry
to end whaling, who have few qualms
with another silicon dioxide processing
plant being built in this country, and
who don’t seem to be particularly con-
cerned about repeated reports of the ap-
palling state of factory farming in this
country.
I agree our government is leftist,
and I’m one of few people who think
their economic policies are doing our
country good. But where’s the green,
exactly?
If I could have one wish for the polit-
ical landscape of this country in 2012,
it would be to see environmentalism
made a real priority, instead of resting
on our geothermal laurels while we
brag about how green we are—as we’ve
usually done in previous years.
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