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– Abid was the best at cheating with the ball. He was the best at scoring goals. The Minister of Education, Guri Melby, who this weekend assumes the position of party leader in the Liberal Party, summarizes her satisfied efforts on the football field for the new leadership of the Liberal Party.
Trine with a new job
Dagbladet meets with them for an interview on how the three who until recently were vying for the leadership position will now sit together at the helm.
They themselves have chosen the Kampen school in Oslo as a backdrop and the interview begins with a football session in honor of the photographer.
It turns out that Guri Melby has not only scored the leadership position, but also has a fairly accurate goal foot.
– Sveinung didn’t hit at all! shouts the Minister of Culture and Sports, Abid Raja, but then Melby enters and consoles:
– He made very nice passes.
Rotevatn has a different approach than what happened in the course:
– I was the one who ran and worked more, he says dryly.
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Painful leadership change
A rare and prolonged and painful change of leadership will finally culminate this weekend. Trine Skei Grande, Terje Breivik and Ola Elvestuen are more or less willingly thanked. Grande announced in March that he would resign, but the crown meant that the national meeting where a new leader would be elected in April was postponed until September.
Just a month ago, the nominating committee announced that they had nominated Guri Melby for the party’s leadership position, followed by Sveinung Rotevatn as first vice president and Abid Raja as second vice president.
Meanwhile, the three of them had been feeling their teeth for months. Apparently.
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– Buuhuu! Abid Raja jokes in response to what it’s like to meet under Melby’s leadership when all three wanted the leadership position.
Guri Melby interrupts him with a laugh:
– We have read in the media that we are in a leadership battle. But we have worked together as usual throughout this period. I don’t follow that there were any problems, he says, before rushing to add:
– But maybe it’s easy for me to say?
Abid Raja also says the internal power struggle is overblown.
-It looked like war, but it wasn’t. We were all available, so we were open to being leaders or deputy leaders of others, he says.
– I was disappointed
Sveinung Rotevatn was the first to come out openly and said that he would like to become the liberal leader.
– I’ll be very honest in saying that I was a little disappointed, he says.
– When available, wait to be singled out. But I shook it off pretty fast. I have never been against others becoming leaders of the Liberal Party, because they are not opponents. But they have been competitors, he says.
Abid Raja recalls that although Rotevatn said he wanted to become leader in May, he was not so prepared.
– In July and I said something like that, a little over 50 percent of me wanted to become a leader. What I have always told the nominating committee is that it is not mandatory for me to become a leader, but I was available. The most important thing is to build a team that can work closely and well together to elevate the community values that concern us. And I have real faith that the three of us together will be able to do that, says Raja.
Guri Melby says that some of the first messages she received after the scene was revealed were from Raja and Rotevatn.
– They congratulated and wrote something like “this is going to be fine”. It made it so much easier for me.
Clean slate
Step back even further: When Trine Skei Grande resigned, it was Abid Raja and Sveinung Rotevatn who were considered the favorites to take over the leadership position.
The original recommendation of the nominating committee had not found a place for Guri Melby in leadership. She previously admitted that she found it disappointing. A few days later, Grande threw in the towel and made it clear that she was resigning as leader.
– I no longer think I can put this together, as expected, he said.
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Later, the accusations against him about the coup and that he had pressured Rotevatn to back her were acclaimed.
– So I thought that both me, Abid and Trine could make it work. We agreed to be together on that stage. Trine of a different opinion, we can only take note of that, Rotevatn says today.
– Isn’t it the advantage that we now start with blank pages? Ask Melby.
– There was another response from the party organization to the recommendation in March. He probably wasn’t indifferent to Trine’s choice either. There was a lot of discomfort. Now, I feel like most people have mostly settled with this here. It also makes us feel better that this is something the party nods to and thinks is good, says Melby.
Rotevatn agrees:
– There were different people in the match who cheered me on, Guri and Abid, but I haven’t experienced anyone after the stage thinking that this is a big defeat. I think most of the people in the party are comfortable with the fact that the three of us will be in the leadership of the party. At least we feel comfortable with each other and we work really well together. So I think this will work very well.
BUILDING TEAMS: Photo: Christian Roth Christensen / Dagbladet
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– Hurry
– What about Melby, have you been invited to eat pizza and work as a team?
– We already started a little. But we work together all the time. We talk several times a week about the jobs we have. We need to find a way of working that works for us. At the same time, we are having a pretty bad time. Less than a year before the elections.
– The main focus will be to specify the main problems and the profile. We must make sure that the entire organization is involved. During October, we will probably visit every team in the county, says Melby.
– We started having some meetings before the summer. A little barbecue at home, and we still have that now, Raja reveals.
– Not long ago we had a sushi meeting in Sveinung. We can tell everything about how it looked there, it was very neat, he jokes.
Agree cooperation
The question of who the Liberal Party should cooperate with has been a source of constant discussion in the Liberal Party. But this is not something that divides the new leadership of the party.
– Since I joined the Liberal Party, there have been discussions about government cooperation. But he has never had so little discussion about it as now. It may be because the party is very comfortable with the government we are in now, says Rotevatn.
Guri Melby points out that they have the government for which they went to the polls.
– I do not see reason to discuss another thing as the political situation is now. The way I see it, it’s very unattractive to have to go any other way, says Melby, who has Raja’s support.
– We make great strides and you don’t change partners when things are going so well.
Say yes to the EU
The same seems to apply to the EU question, where it is heading for a historic change for the Liberal Party. By all accounts, this weekend’s national assembly will join the majority in the program committee and the national board, which will include in the principle program that Norway should join the EU.
– As with the issue of government, this has been demanding in the Liberal Party for a long time. But now the principles program committee that I have sat on has come up with a recommendation that most believe we should say a principled yes to EU membership.
– For my part, I am glad that it appears that the Liberal Party will clearly say that we are in favor of strong European cooperation. Not just where others participate, but where we participate as well, says Rotevatn, who receives Melby’s full support.
– You can sign it, she says.
Abid Raja also says that he will vote for the change in the principle program.
– In short, I think it is correct to say that it is basically three EU supporters, he says.
– The life situation will affect
– What kind of leftist leadership is compared to the previous one?
– I think that age and life situation also help shape you as a politician. The fact that we are a few years younger than the current managerial trio and live a slightly different life. Abid and I both have children. And Sveinung may have children soon, says Melby, with a joke at Rotevatn’s expense.
(VG was able to report recently that he just befriended journalist Nora Rydne, but no baby news yet)
– I probably think that each generation has its own problems, its own approach and its own way of speaking. But then I think we are really concerned about the same issues that Trine, Ola and Terje were passionate about: the Liberal Party should still be a climate and environment party, but perhaps highlight it in a slightly different way.
