Jón Gnarr says Viðreisn replaced its group leader too late

Independent MP Jón Gnarr says Viðreisn should have replaced its parliamentary group leader much earlier after Sigmar Guðmundsson went on sick leave, according to an interview published by mbl.is. Sigmar has now stepped down, and Pawel Bartoszek has taken over.

Gnarr welcomed the change but said it was unfair and unacceptable to lawmakers to leave the situation unresolved for so long. “This was a decision that should have been made a long time ago,” he said in the interview programme Spursmál.

He described the parliamentary group’s work as central to MPs’ duties in parliament and its committees. Gnarr said he did not want to discuss Sigmar’s illness, adding that it was up to the person concerned to speak about it.

Gnarr also compared his experience in Viðreisn to acting in a television series. He had liked the script and the group, he said, but later felt that the director had stopped showing up while production continued. Asked whether he was describing a complete lack of control, he replied that there had been “a lack of management and wrong decisions”.

Gnarr has left Viðreisn’s parliamentary group.