My comment to this article: http://www.newstatesman.com/world-affairs/world-affairs/2013/04/laplands-sami-people-how-do-you-decide-who-indigenous-and-who-is

The Sami parliament won't be able to oust anyone out of "their" land if this goes through (as I hope it will). It's just about control of part of state land, which in the past was in communal ownership as much as anyone owned it before it was declared to be state land.

It's basically wilderness and Finnish laws are very different from Anglo-Saxon laws when it comes to land ownership & use and gives very wide public rights of use of land in private ownership beyond the owner's front-yard. In effect, there would be little to no change to ordinary folks.

Although reindeer herders make the most noise (they tend to be vocal bunch ;) ) it's effect on reindeer herding will probably be minimal, but the Finnish reindeer herders see even minor changes as possible dangers to their livelihoods. (Sami reindeer herders do too when it comes to other issues.)

What would be affected would be big companies, traditional Finnish companies with powerful political connections - timber, hydro-electric power etc - that have been given preferential use of state land and the international mining companies that are now rushing to northern Finland to exploit natural resources and our lax, antiquated mining laws.

It's these latter powers that are using "ethnic" issues to oppose the legislation and they have some powerful politicians in their pockets, like the current rightwing president Sauli Niinistö, who during his victorious presidential campaign opposed the legislation and refused to tour in the affected area altogether.