Only two candidates remain in the race to succeed Sauli Niinistö as Finnish president, with voters set to choose between one-time PM Alexander Stubb and former foreign minister Pekka Haavisto in the second round run-off.
The first round saw especially high turnout, and Professor of World Politics at the University of Helsinki, Teivo Teivainen, told the show that this election was a clean break from the last one in 2018 when Niinistö was the overwhelming favourite and won by a landslide.
"Now, the stakes were higher," said Teivainen. "I guess the last-minute opinion polls that showed Halla-aho gaining gave new excitement that votes do matter."
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APN caught up with both candidates on the campaign trail, with poll frontrunner Stubb telling the show that Finnish voters will make a "rational" choice at the ballot box.
"They look at who might be the candidate to navigate us through rather stormy waters. They might look at international relations. They will look at what kind of capacity does the potential president have in being commander-in-chief in what I call Nato Finland," Stubb said.
Haavisto on the other hand noted that many of the voters he meets on the hustings want to speak about issues such as the economy and regional development.
"People are actually asking domestic questions, even though they know well that this is not the president's mandate, but they want to have a president who knows the country, and I think this is something that, at least for me, is playing a big role," he said.
Aside from analysing the presidential election, the show also wraps up all the rest of the week's news from Finland, including the impact of widespread strikes and a robot hit-and-run.
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This week's show was presented by Egan Richardson and Zena Iovino, with additional reporting by Matthew Schilke and Ronan Browne. The sound engineer was Juha Hjelm.
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