The Helsinki City Council chose Juhana Vartiainen (NCP) as the Mayor at its first meeting. Anni Sinnemäki (Greens) continues as Deputy Mayor for Urban Environment. Nasima Razmyar, Deputy Mayor for Culture and Leisure of the previous council period, becomes the Deputy Mayor for Education. Daniel Sazonov (NCP) starts as Deputy Mayor for Social Services and Health Care, while Paavo Arhinmäki (Left Alliance) is Deputy Mayor for Culture and Leisure.
At its first meeting, the City Council also chose the presiding officers. The Council chose the Green League’s Fatim Diarra as its chairperson. Diarra is a communications expert, a deputy chairperson of the Green League and a city councillor for the second period.
The first vice chair is Member of Parliament Wille Rydman (NCP) and the second vice chair is State Secretary Pilvi Torsti (SDP).
All the decisions were unanimous. The term of office of the Mayors started on 2 August and lasts for the council period of four years.
Mayor Juhana Vartiainen
Juhana Vartiainen (NCP) is a Member of Parliament, economist and Doctor of Political Sciences.
Vartiainen was born in 1958. Having lived both in Helsinki and Paris as a child, Vartiainen studied economics at the University of Helsinki and obtained his doctor's degree in 1992. Since then, he has worked as an economist, researcher and with managerial responsibilities in research organisations in Finland and Sweden.
In 2003, Vartiainen started as the head of the Swedish Trade Union Institute for Economic Research (FIEF), from where he went to become the head of research of the National Institute of Economic Research in Sweden. In 2012, Vartiainen became Director General of the Institute for Economic Research (VATT). In 2015, he was elected as a Member of Parliament.
Deputy Mayor for Urban Environment Anni Sinnemäki
Anni Sinnemäki (Greens) has worked as Deputy Mayor of the Urban Environment in 2017–2021 and as the Deputy Mayor in charge of city planning and real estate in 2015–2017.
Previously, Sinnemäki has served as a Green Member of Parliament, as the chairperson of the party and as Minister of Labour. In Helsinki, she has been a city councillor since 2005 and, among other things, the chairperson of the culture and library committee.
Sinnemäki was born in 1973 in Helsinki. She has studied Russian literature at the university of Helsinki and graduated as a Bachelor of Arts in 2001. She has written lyrics for the Ultra Bra band, as well as the poetry books Sokeana hetkenä and Aleksis Kiven katu.
Deputy Mayor for Education Nasima Razmyar
Nasima Razmyar (SDP) has been the Deputy Mayor for Culture and Leisure in 2017–2021.
She has previously worked as a Member of Parliament, as a political aide to the SDP’s parliamentary group and as the communications secretary of the parliamentary group. Razmyar has also worked for the International Organization for Migration (IOM) and at the Mannerheim League for Child Welfare and Monika Naiset association with migrant questions. Razmyar was first elected to the Helsinki City Council in 2012.
Nasima Razmyar was born in 1984 in Kabul, Afghanistan. She has a Community Educator degree from the Humak University of Applied Sciences and she has also completed a bachelor’s degree in culture management at Metropolia University of Applied Sciences.
Deputy Mayor for Social Services and Health Care Daniel Sazonov
Daniel Sazonov (NCP) is the chairperson of the council group of the national coalition party in Helsinki, city councillor and the Strategy Director of the National Coalition Party. Previously, Sazonov has worked as Special Adviser to the Minister of Education at the Ministry of Education and Culture, as advocacy expert and advisory lawyer, as well as the chairperson for the Union of Upper Secondary School Students and the Youth of the National Coalition Party.
Sazonov was born in 1993 in Helsinki. He has studied legal sciences at the university of Helsinki and graduated as a Master of Law in 2020.
Deputy Mayor for Culture and Leisure Paavo Arhinmäki
Paavo Arhinmäki (Left Alliance) is a Member of Parliament and chairperson of the parliamentary group. He has served as a Member of Parliament since 2007 and as Minister of Culture and Sports in 2011–2014. He has previously been an aide to a Member of Parliament, the chairperson for the Left Youth and in editorial work. He has been a city councillor in Helsinki since 2001.
Arhinmäki was born in 1976 in Helsinki. Arhinmäki is a secondary school graduate and a student of political science at the University of Helsinki.