Lars Ohly was a member of the Swedish parliament from 1998 to 2014.
23 Facts About Lars Ohly
1.
2.
Lars Ohly was born in the Spanga suburb of Stockholm.
3.
Lars Ohly's father, like all his forefathers for six generations, was a priest.
4.
Lars Ohly is still employed at SJ, but is on leave of absence since 1994.
5.
Lars Ohly joined the Communist Youth in 1978, and the Left Party in 1979.
6.
Lars Ohly became a member of board of the Communist Youth in 1980, was elected as a substitute of the party board in 1987, and became a full member of the party board in 1990.
7.
Lars Ohly has been a Member of Parliament since 1998.
8.
Lars Ohly was in 2008 nominated for the award Kurd friend of the year.
9.
Lars Ohly was elected party chairman on 20 February 2004, succeeding Ulla Hoffmann.
10.
When confronted about this, Lars Ohly claimed it to be an indeliberate error on his part.
11.
Several quotes by Lars Ohly were found where he defended the political systems of the Eastern bloc.
12.
Several prominent party members, among them former party leader Lars Werner, witnessed about Ohly's views.
13.
The programme showed that Lars Ohly branded himself as a Leninist as late as 1999.
14.
On 30 October 2005, Lars Ohly declared on Swedish TV that he would stop labeling himself a communist.
15.
Lars Ohly then released a statement that he considers Cuba to be a dictatorship and that he is critical of the lack of political freedom in Cuba, a statement which in response was criticized by the chairman of the Swedish-Cuban Association.
16.
In September 2005, Lars Ohly declared that he had left the organisation.
17.
Lars Ohly later apologized and said that he experienced a "temporary blackout".
18.
Lars Ohly is strongly opposed to letting privately owned companies operate in industries traditionally controlled by the Swedish state, for instance education and healthcare.
19.
Lars Ohly says his children made their choices based on what was best for them, independent of his views on the matter.
20.
Lars Ohly is often cited to have said he cried tears of sadness when learning of the tearing down of the Berlin Wall.
21.
When reporter Janne Josefsson of Uppdrag Granskning confronted him with an interview clip from 2004 where the statement was uttered, Lars Ohly refused to watch it.
22.
Lars Ohly initially claimed to have received an SMS message from his friend, which was impossible, since the world's first text message was sent in 1992.
23.
Lars Ohly later claimed that he actually spoke to his friend by phone.