Although millions of euros of public aid have been given to millionaire companies, thousands of small and middle size companies are rejected by Business Finland.
Many entrepreneurs in Finland became angry after learning that the funding from the state financial company Business Finland has in many cases gone to the accounts of big service companies (for example consultants) with millions of euros of turnover.
Thousands of small businesses are now facing closure due to the coronavirus crisis. Therefore Foreigner.fi asked the readers in a Twitter poll, “Who should take responsibility for Business Finland's failure?”
In the poll, the respondents were given four options which were 'Prime Minister', 'Minister Economic Affairs', 'CEO of Business Finland’ and 'Nobody'.
The mini poll was answered by 52 readers and 55.8% of the readers said CEO of Business Finland should take the responsibility of the failure. 21.2% voted 'Minister Economic Affairs '; 11.5% voted 'Prime Minister' and 11.5% said 'Nobody’.
Who should take responsibility for Business Finland's failure?
— Foreigner.fi (@foreignerfi) April 24, 2020
Of course, this is a mini poll but it is reflecting the public opinion and somebody should take this failure’s responsibility.
On the other hand, last week, Business Finland's CEO Nina Kopola told the economic newspaper Kauppalehti that all decisions had been made in accordance with the stated criteria. And she admitted no criticism at all.
“I don’t mind the need for such an internal audit, but I don’t feel we had any shortcomings. We have not divided the money right and left. We have a clear process, and each application has one rapporteur and one decision-maker," Kopola said.
Kopola also claimed that Business Finland audits its own decisions regularly and no errors have been detected.
