Kristine Raahauge
Kristine Marie Raahauge was a Greenlandic municipal politician, activist, eskimologist and writer. She represented the Siumut party.
Early life and family
Raahauge was born in 1949 into a seal-catching family in the remote village of Ilulissat, Greenland. She was the oldest of seven children.When she was nine years old, Raahauge and her family moved to the town of Nanortalik. Her isolated home village is now depopulated.
On March 25, 1972, Raahauge married Paul Raahauge, a schoolteacher born in Denmark. They had three children Anja, Brit and Axel. In 1976, the family moved to Kolby Kås on Samsø Island, and they both worked at a boarding school where 60 Greenlandic children attended.
Museum career
Raahauge and her husband moved to Nanortalik, where he worked at the local school. She became a member of the Greenland Museums Committee from 1991 to 1995. She was later employed as Director of the Nanortalik Museum until 1993.Political career
Raahauge was a member of the Siumut political party. In 1993, Raahauge was elected Mayor of the Nanortalik municipality. She served as mayor until 1997.Raahauge ran for office in the 1995 parliamentary elections and was elected to the Inatsisartut for a term. During her term, she fought against centralisation and to preserve local self-government. She chose not to run again in the 1999 elections.
In 2004, after the resignation of Tage Frederiksen, Raahauge was re-elected mayor with the four votes from Siumut and two from Inuit Ataqatigiit. She served until the 2009 administrative reform, where the number of municipalities in Greenland was reduced to four.