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DE RUEHCP #0253/01 1541505
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
P 031505Z JUN 09
FM AMEMBASSY COPENHAGEN
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC PRIORITY 4984
INFO RUEHZL/EUROPEAN POLITICAL COLLECTIVE PRIORITY

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 02 COPENHAGEN 000253 
 
SENSITIVE 
SIPDIS 
 
DEPARTMENT FOR P, EUR, EUR/NB, AND OES 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PGOV PREL DA
SUBJECT: HISTORIC GREENLANDIC ELECTIONS USHER IN NEW 
GENERATION OF LEADERSHIP 
 
REF: A. 08 COPENHAGEN 614 
     ¶B. 07 COPENHAGEN 1010 
 
¶1. (SBU) Summary: Greenlanders, in an historic June 2 
election, threw out the ruling party that has held the reins 
of government in Greenland for the last 30 years.  The 
decisive winner was Greenland's largest left-wing opposition 
party, which ran a skillful campaign focused on addressing 
Greenland's many pressing social needs.  The election also 
ratified a generational change in Greenlandic politics, with 
some of Greenland's most senior politicians pushed into 
retirement by a younger and better educated slate of 
newcomers, many of whom were standing for election for the 
first time.  Greenland must now form a government that can 
deliver on voters' clear desire for change.  The election 
provides the United States with a unique opportunity, as a 
new generation of Greenlanders steps up, to intensify our 
engagement with Greenland and shape the attitudes of a 
political generation that expect in their careers to see 
Greenland emerge as an independent Arctic nation.  End 
Summary. 
 
¶2. (U) Greenlanders went to the polls June 2 in general 
elections to the Landsting, or Greenlandic Parliament. 
Although today still a dependent territory of Denmark, 
Greenland has had a Home Rule Government, drawn from the 
Landsting, since 1979.  Since that time, the Siumut (or 
"Forward" in Greenlandic) Party has held power in Greenland, 
either alone or in coalition, and has for those 30 years 
fielded Greenland's head of its Home Rule Government, the 
Premier (equivalent to Prime Minister).  However, in a 
decisive break with that past, Greenlanders this week voted 
Siumut out and handed Greenland's largest left-wing 
opposition party, Inuit Ataqatigiit (IA, or "Inuit 
Community") a landslide victory.  IA garnered 43.7 percent of 
the vote, nearly doubling its result from Greenland's last 
Landsting election in 2005.  Siumut captured 26.5 percent of 
the vote, down from its 2005 result of 30.4 percent.  The 
result gives IA 14 seats in the 31-member Landsting, meaning 
IA needs only two more seats to form a governing majority of 
16 seats. 
 
¶3. (U) IA's decisive win means that Kuupik Kleist, IA's 
chairman, will become Greenland's next Premier.  Kleist has 
his pick of two potential coalition partners -- the 
Democrats, who will have four seats in the upcoming 
Landsting, and Atassut ("Solidarity"), who will have three. 
The Democrats and Atassut are center-right parties that have 
in the past sometimes clashed with IA, particularly on 
economic and business issues.  However, before the election 
both parties indicated their willingness to work with IA in a 
coalition.  Kleist, in the hours following his party's 
victory, announced that he would under no circumstances allow 
Siumut into a new IA-led coalition. 
 
¶4. (SBU) Kleist and IA owe their win to a savvy campaign that 
both addressed Greenlandic voters' desire for a break with 
Siumut policies, and brought a young and diverse slate of 
candidates that injected dynamism into the election debate. 
Eight of IA's Landsting members will be women, as was half 
its candidate slate.  Siumut, by contrast, was widely 
criticized even within its own ranks for its small number of 
women candidates.  IA also recruited younger, well-educated 
Greenlanders in their 20's and 30's to balance against older, 
more established party members.  IA's success was all the 
more significant in that it performed well not only in Nuuk, 
the capital, but in Greenland's many small and remote towns 
and villages, traditional Siumut strongholds. 
 
¶5. (SBU) Siumut also had the disadvantage of running against 
its own governing record, which for the past four years has 
been moribund, particularly on difficult domestic social 
issues like child poverty and neglect, declining education 
standards, and an eroding health care system.  Siumut not 
only failed to adequately address these issues, it also 
throughout the campaign was frequently confronted with one 
scandal after another, from allegations of corrupion and 
nepotism to abuse of expense accounts tomanipulation of Home 
Rule administered companies.  In the end, Siumut seemed 
unable to muster a coherent political message, leaving the 
field wide open for IA's better-run, more tightly focused 
campaign. 
 
¶6. (SBU) Comment: Kleist now has the difficult task of 
delivering on the high expectations set by IA during the 
campaign, and he may choose both the Democrats and Atassut as 
coalition partners to build the broadest possible majorities 
for what are likely to be tough fights as IA moves to roll 
back entrenched Siumut policies and patronage networks.  In 
 
COPENHAGEN 00000253  002 OF 002 
 
 
so doing Kleist will no doubt call on a new generation of 
Greenlanders to offer fresh policies and a more technocratic 
approach to implementing them.  Many of IA's candidates are 
completely new to politics, and this election offered special 
significance for them since it is the first Landsting to be 
seated under Greenland's new Self Governance Agreement with 
Denmark, which enters into force June 21 (ref A).  Young 
Greenlanders thus see this election as an opportunity to draw 
a line under 30 years of Siumut rule, and most feel confident 
that with further economic development they could be the 
generation that creates an independent Greenland. 
 
¶7. (SBU) Comment Continued: The election also offers the 
United States the opportunity to step up its engagement in 
Greenland, and cement ties to a new generation of Greenlandic 
political leaders.  In an April 23 meeting in Nuuk with 
Charge, Kleist told us that he values Greenland's emerging 
ties to the United States and welcomes the opportunity to 
work with us through fora like the U.S.-Greenland-Denmark 
Joint Committee.  Kleist seemed determined to establish his 
international credentials with us, noting in fluent English 
that he had previously led Greenland's nascent Department of 
Foreign Affairs in the late 1990s, and showing interest in 
how Greenland could better use other regional fora like the 
Arctic Council to advance Greenland's interests. Kleist told 
us he would welcome more educational exchange opportunities 
with U.S. high schools and universities, and he voiced the 
hope that USG agencies would continue to commit serious 
resources to Joint Committee activities.  We believe that 
Kleist is sincere in wanting to maintain a close relationship 
with the U.S. and we see opportunities to help better inform 
the views of some of his new Landsting colleagues, whether 
through vehicles like IV programs or USG technical 
assistance.  Finally, we see the new Greenlandic government 
as the latest example of why the USG should have at least a 
seasonal presence on the ground in Nuuk.  Our proposal for an 
American Presence Post, staffed seasonally by Embassy 
Copenhagen personnel (ref B), would be a relatively low cost, 
high impact way to enhance our influence with Greenland's new 
government. 
 
¶8. (U) Bio Note for Kuupik Kleist.  Born Jakob Edvard Kuupik 
Kleist, March 31, 1958 in Qullissat, Greenland. Attended 
primary schools in Qullissat and Sisimiut, Greenland. 
Attended high school in Birkerod Public School in Denmark and 
received a masters degree in sociology from Roskilde 
University in Denmark in 1983. Deputy Director of the 
Greenland Home Rule Government's Department of Education from 
1985 - 1988.  Director of journalism education in Nuuk from 
1988 - 1991.  Director and Minister of Home Rule's Department 
of Foreign Affairs from 1996 - 1999. Political posts include 
Minister of Public Works and Transport from 1991 - 1995, and 
Member of the Danish Parliament representing Greenland from 
2001 - 2007.  Chairman of Inuit Ataqatigiit (IA) political 
party since 2007. Kleist was also a member of the 
Danish-Greenlandic Self Governance Commission, which drafted 
the new Self Governance Agreement, from 2004 - 2008.  Kleist 
speaks Greenlandic, Danish, and English.  Single, no children. 
MCCULLEY