Iceland's Pirate Party Gaining Popularity
ANDERSON: Loud calls for change from protesters in Iceland who have all this week have been demanding that the Prime Minister Sigmundur David Gunnlaugsson quit. That's after documents from the so- called Panama Papers leak seemed to show him and his wife hiding millions of dollars using a secret offshore company. Well, a day ago it seemed like it seemed like he had resigned, but now he says he's only stepping aside and even then only for a little while what his office describes as, quote, an unspecified amount of time. That's after his request for a snap election was refused by Iceland's president who said he needed more time to speak to other leaders before doing that. Well, if those snap election do go ahead, a Gallup poll shows that the anti-establishment Pirate Party could make strong gains. This is their website where they seem to be taking their name quite literally. Well, let's speak to Birgitta Jonsdottir now. She's the co-founder of the Icelandic Pirate Party and is with us via Skype from Reykjavik. Birgitta, your Twitter feed was full of remarks yesterday about the prime minister resigning. Now it turns out he hasn't, or maybe he has, but not for long. What do you want at this point and why?</s>BIRGITTA JONSDOTTIR, CO-FOUNDER ICLANDIC PIRATE PARTY: Well, of course, I want him to fully resign. I think that's the only logical response to the very serious reporting that's been coming out through Panama leaks, or the Panama Papers. He, however, has not been clear about it. And it's very confusing. Nobody really knows what's going on. So, I am the party chairman in the parliament and so I just had a meeting with the speaker with the minority and the parliament is demanding that we get to vote for vote of confidence.</s>ANDERSON: All right. A new poll, a new Gallup polls shows nearly 4 out of every 5 people in Iceland want him to go. You are clearly making political capital out of what in the end is essentially Birgitta just a conflict of interest. It's not clear that he would have been enriched in any way. Is that really enough to force him out?</s>JONSDOTTIR: Well, according to popular opinion, it is indeed. It is, of course, in context of the financial collapse in Iceland in 2008 where people wanted to build the society that was based on honesty, transparency and openness.</s>ANDERSON: ...and his wife, as far as I understand it, say that the shell company that owns these bank shares is perfectly legal. It's declared to authorities. And it pays its taxes. So, again, what's the real problem here?</s>JONSDOTTIR: Well, first of all he did not disclose this before the last elections or the elections before. He was working on lifting off the capital controls in Iceland where him or his wife were one of the claim -- the people with claims in the banks. And so he was hitting at both ends of the table. He built his campaign before last elections on getting the voters like he called the people with claims in the banks. So I guess he sees himself as a vulture or his wife.</s>ANDERSON: What does the Pirate Party stand for, Birgitta?</s>JONSDOTTIR: Well, we stand for democratic reform. We stand for moving our legislation into the 21st Century that deals with the reality of the digital world we live in. We have been putting a lot of focus on creating a safe haven for information, expression and speech. And of course digital privacy. We want the new constitution that the people of Iceland vote to be implemented like was promised in 2012. So, we want the real fundamental changes in the way we run our country.</s>ANDERSON: Do you -- very briefly call yourself a poetician as opposed to a politicians. What do you mean by that?</s>JONSDOTTIR: Well, I am a poet first and a web developer, but I decided I want to be a poet when I was 14. So I was -- I felt, you know, very many people feel that the word politician is like declaring that you are a leper. So I feel more comfortable calling myself a poetician and I want to apply creative talk with the work I do in the parliament and think outside the box. And that is one thing that artists are quite good at.</s>ANDERSON: A politicians who doesn't want to be called or known as a politician. Interesting. Birgitta, thank you very much indeed for joining us, out of Reykjavik this evening on what is a continuing story on the fallout from these so- called Panama Papers. Well, before his loss in Wisconsin, the Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump finally laid out how Mexico could pay for his controversial border wall plan. Our Raphael Romo spoke to some Mexican immigrants in Atlanta. Their reaction to Trump's latest proposal ranged from anger to disbelief.</s>RAFAEL ROMO, CNN CORRESPONDENT: If you go to communities across the United States with high concentration of immigrants from Latin America, you're going to find places like this. Here in Atlanta, Fiesta Plaza not only shopping center but also a place where immigrants, mainly Mexicans, get together. They shop, they dine in little restaurants like this one and they do one more thing that is crucial for their families back home, they send money to Mexico.</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It's very important to send money because they are working really hard here and they have most -- most of them, they have families over there and it's very hard to find jobs in Mexico.</s>ROMO: Donald Trump's reported plan to force the Mexican government to pay for a border wall by stopping undocumented immigrants from transferring money to Mexico as you can imagine is cause for great concern for Mexican immigrants, documented or not. "This is complete foolishness," she says. "He can do it and we will let him. We're going to keep on sending money to our people as we always have." According to Mexico Central bank, Mexicans abroad sent nearly $24.8 billion to their country last year, mainly from the United States. This is more money than Mexico's total oil revenues for 2015, estimated at 23.4 billion. This is the first time that incoming money transfers are higher than oil revenues since they started taking records in 1995. So, Donald Trump wants to block money transfers to Mexico to build a wall. What do you think about that?</s>ROMO: "He only makes me laugh," she says. "I don't agree. I'm proudly Mexicans and don't agree with what this gentlemen wants to do." "He's crazy," she says. "They should take him to see a psychiatrist. I hope all Hispanics, those who are citizens, go out and vote against him." These immigrants say no matter what, Mexicans will always find a way to help their families back home. Rafael Romo, CNN, Atlanta.</s>ANDERSON: 29 minutes past 7:00 here in the UAE. The latest world news headlines for you just ahead at the bottom of the hour. And I just sent my colleague Samuel Burke a WhatsApp message, but it's unlike any I have ever sent him before. He's going to explain why up next -- Samuel.</s>SAMUEL BURKE, CNN MONEY CORRESPONDENT: That's right. It's a huge shift, a seachange like we have never seen before in encryption and in technology community. We have got all the details coming up, Becky.