Erna Solberg has made it clear that she wants to continue as leader of the Conservative Party and be the party’s candidate for prime minister at the general election in 2025.
However, it is uncertain whether Solberg will also be the prime ministerial candidate of the other parties on the bourgeois side. At the weekend, Venstre leader Guri Melby kicked off the discussion when she told TV 2 that she will stand as prime minister candidate “if the party and the people want me”. Now a number of Storting politicians from the Progress Party are reporting for their own party leader.
– My candidate for prime minister is of course Sylvi Listhaug, says Per-Willy Amundsen, head of the justice committee at the Storting.
He emphasizes that there must be a process in the FRP in which they must decide which parties they want to cooperate with and what kind of government alternative they will go for in the election.
But Amundsen would strongly advise against the FRP being part of a government where the Liberal Party has the prime minister.
– The party must decide what they think, but my clear perspective is that the Liberals stand for so much weirdness on immigration, integration, and justice policy – a number of areas that are very important to the FRP, and which I, as a professional politician, find it very difficult to see out to collaborate with them on.
A breath of fresh air
Amundsen believes party leader Listhaug would be a “clear and clear” leader for the country.
– Listhaug would be a breath of fresh air. With her, we would have a leader with a clear project, which many in Norway would recognize. We would, for one thing, have a prime minister who set some clear political goals and actually implemented them.
– Many will think that Listhaug is also quite a polarizing politician?
– Yes, but politics is a little too often about agreeing with everyone. It is clear that a leader with clear opinions and goals will also be polarizing. It is the negative portrayal of a manager with a clear project. When the Labor Party and the Center Party govern, people scratch their heads and wonder what the political project is. They can’t even answer that themselves, says Amundsen.
Supported by several
Storting representative Erlend Wiborg also believes that Listhaug should be the Frp’s prime ministerial candidate.
– I relate to the fact that the FRP’s candidate for prime minister is our party leader. Then we will have a discussion about who we want to collaborate with and who we don’t, says Wiborg.
So does Terje Halleland.
– Our starting point is to go to the election with our party leader as candidate. We have not been in the habit of doing anything else, he says, and adds:
– I have recorded what Guri Melby has said. Not a bad word about her, she could certainly do well as prime minister in many governments, but for us that is probably not an option.
Halleland also indicates that there will be processes in the party in the run-up to the election. In order for Listhaug to become a real alternative, several changes must take place towards 2025, he believes.
– Then the FRP must offer a policy that can unite several parties. As of today, there is probably less chance that the FRP can expect to get the prime minister in 2025. But there is much that can change. Now we’re going to make a new program, so we’ll see what happens.
Internal processes
Two months have passed since it became known to the public that Erna Solberg’s husband engaged in extensive share trading during the period she was prime minister, and that Solberg has been disqualified in a number of cases as a result.
After Økokrim concluded that there was no basis for opening an investigation against Sindre Finnes or Erna Solberg for possible insider trading and after Solberg was questioned by the Storting’s Control and Constitution Committee about the case, Solberg announced on Monday 13 November that she is “fully motivated , perhaps more motivated than in a long time to continue to be the Conservative party leader, and thus also to be the Conservative Party’s prime ministerial candidate in 2025”.
The decision has broad support in Høyre’s central board.
FRP deputy leader Hans Andreas Limi’s reply was that they took Solberg’s decision “on note”. Limi tells Klassekampen that they will also not interfere in who the Liberal Party chooses as its candidate for prime minister.
He believes that it is completely natural that several Frp-ers point to Listhaug.
– But so far we have not taken a position on it in the FRP. We have initiated some internal processes on strategy and possible collaboration constellations. Prime Minister candidate has not been discussed so far, so I will wait to say anything about it, says Limi.
