Greenlanders will trudge across ice and snow Tuesday to cast their ballots in an election that could prove to be one of the most consequential in the Arctic island’s history.
Amid United States President Donald Trump’s repeated threats to take over Greenland, voters in the self-ruling Danish territory will elect 31 members of its legislature, the Inatsisartut, as they do every four years.
This time around, the stakes are existential: nothing less than Greenland’s place in the world — including whether it should remain part of Denmark, seek independence, or forge closer ties with major powers like the U.S. and Europe.
“The politicians have not been very clear about what independence really is,” Masaana Egede, editor-in-chief of the Greenlandic daily Sermitsiaq, told a video briefing with international journalists last week, responding to a question by
POLITICO.
“Is it economic independence? A feeling of independence? Having our own borders?” Egede said. “We’re talking this much about it because it stirs emotions in us. We want independence, but we all have very different definitions of what independence is,” he said.
Egede — who is the half-brother of Prime Minister Múte Egede — said there are 32 areas where Denmark still makes decisions on Greenland's behalf. “Say we’d take over one per year, it would still take us 32 years to become really independent,” he said.
Currently, the party with the most seats in the Inatsisartut is Inuit Ataqatigiit, or “Community of the People,” together with its coalition partner Siumut, or “Forward.” Both parties are pro-independence and have vowed to call a referendum on the island’s separation from Denmark, without specifying when that vote will be.
