Helsinki--Juha Sipila, widely expected to become Finland's next prime minister after Sunday's general election, is a soft-spoken 53-year-old IT entrepreneur who has risen rapidly through party ranks.
Sipila's liberal-agrarian Centre Party is leading in the polls, and he is expected to form an as-yet-undefined coalition to take over from the left-right government of Conservative Prime Minister Alexander Stubb.
The contrast between Stubb and Sipila is striking: while Stubb is outgoing and vivacious, happily sharing his running times on Twitter, Sipila is known for being taciturn and straightforward, choosing his words carefully.
In a public opinion poll published on Monday, 64 percent of voters said they wanted the Centre Party -- which has fostered 12 prime ministers and three presidents, including Urho Kekkonen from 1956 to 1982 -- to return to power.
The Centre has been in opposition since 2011, losing those elections after almost a decade in government.
Originally from Oulu in northwestern Finland, Sipila became politically active only recently, though he has been a member of the Centre Party since his youth.
Elected a member of parliament in 2011, he became Centre Party leader in 2012 when he was still virtually unknown to most Finns, benefitting from a deep renewal of the party.
Known for his modesty, large network and good people skills, "he's a leader that the urban supporters of the Centre Party and the agrarian supporters can both agree on," Helsinki University political science professor Juhana Aunesluoma told AFP.
AFP
