Vote Of No Confidence Submitted Against Iceland’s Justice Minister

The Social Democrats and the Pirates submitted a parliamentary proposal vote of no confidence against Minister of Justice Sigríður Andersen yesterday, Kjarninn reports.

Despite this, and the vast majority of Icelanders who want her to resign, RÚV reports that Prime Minister Katrín Jakobsdóttir says she has “complete trust” in all the government ministers.

Sigríður’s tenure as Minister of Justice, both during the previous and the current government, has been fraught with controversy. She played an instrumental role in the scandal involving “restored honour” for a convicted paedophile, and broke the law when she appointed a judge to the Court of Appeal against the advisement of committees designed to assess qualifications for potential judges.

Further, as Minister of Justice, she presides over the Directorate of Immigration, which has made numerous deportation decisions that go against both Icelandic law and international agreements, resulting in widespread and concerted public criticism.

These scandals have led to the conclusion that 72.5% of Icelanders want Sigríður to resign, which is frankly unlikely. Further, even if every single member of the parliamentary opposition voted in favour of the no confidence proposal, there still would not be enough votes to have her fired; the majority outnumbers of the opposition 35 to 28.