Helsinki Deputy Mayor Paavo Arhinmäki describes the graffiti action on Facebook as “thoughtless”.
The deputy mayor of the Finnish capital Helsinki, Paavo Arhinmäki, was caught illegally spraying graffiti in a train tunnel. As the Finnish railway operator announced on Tuesday, removing the graffiti took three hours and cost 3,500 euros. Police are investigating because of property damage and disruption to rail traffic.
Security guards grabbed the 46-year-old man and a friend during traditional mid-summer celebrations on Friday, shortly after they finished graffiti in a train tunnel in the southern Finnish city of Vantaa. Arhinmäki, responsible for culture and leisure in the Finnish capital, apologized a day later in a post on the online service Facebook.
“It was very silly of me and us to do this. I was kind of seduced by the idea that it’s cool to paint this kind of gray concrete wall that has been painted before and is out of sight,” he wrote. His action was “thoughtless”, after all there are walls where spraying is legally allowed.
Helsinki Mayor Juhana Vartiainen told AFP that his deputy’s actions were “reckless”. However, he understands the gravity of the situation. Speaking to Finnish media, Arhinmäki said he doesn’t think his actions are so serious that he needs to step down.
Arhinmäki, 46, is the former president of the Left Alliance and a former member of the Finnish Parliament. From 2011 to 2014 he was Minister of Sport and Culture.