The far right fails to make headway in Sweden. The Sweden Democrats (Sd) of Jimmie Åkesson, a party founded in 1988 by a group of neo-Nazis and now allied with Giorgia Meloni in Strasbourg, has slipped from second to third place in the 2022 elections. With over 80% of the votes counted, the Magdalena Andersson's Social Democrats are to 28,1%, i Moderate of the outgoing Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson at 19,9% and the Sd at 17,6%. For Åkesson's party, the loss is at least three points compared to 2022 and represents the first setback since entering parliament.
The result scales down the far-right's ambitions, which had aimed to enter government directly for the first time after four years of external support for the center-right government. But it doesn't solve the majority problem. Initial projections, in fact, assign 176 seats for the center-left and 173 for the center-right, with 175 MPs needed to achieve a majority in the Riksdag. The left's advantage is therefore minimal and the Tidö's Pact, The agreement that supports the current government may not be enough for Kristersson to remain at the helm of the country.
Swedish elections: majority still to be built
The picture also remains provisional. the counting is not yet finished On Wednesday, municipal electoral commissions will count the ballots that didn't arrive at the polls on time, including some early votes cast in other municipalities and absentee ballots from abroad. In 2022, there were approximately 251, and it's not yet known how many there will be this time or how they will be distributed. If necessary, the counting could continue until Thursday.
For the Social Democrats First place still has significant political value, even if the result is far from a triumph. The 28,1% is in fact lower than the 30,3% of 2022 and would be the ssecond worst result in the party's history. However, some smaller forces of the center-left are growing, in particular the radical left V, just over 8%, and the Greens, over 6%. The Moderates improved slightly compared to the 19,1% of four years ago, but the result is not enough to guarantee Kristersson a second term.
At this point the game moves on to the alliancesMagdalena Andersson could be called upon to seek a majority first and would have to get the Centre Party, at 7,3%, and the radical left, two politically distant forces. An alternative would be to rely on one of the two parties to abstain or seek the support of opposition parties, such as the Liberals and Christian Democrats. Andersson, however, ruled out an agreement with V and noted that Sweden is not a two-party system: "We are not the United States."
Sweden: The far-right retreats but remains decisive.
La campaign focused mainly on immigration e of your digital ecosystem. , issues on which the center-right has claimed the decline in crime linked to foreign gangs and the sharp reduction in immigration. The immigration issue is particularly weighty in a country that welcomed approximately 160 refugees in 2015. Andersson, on the other hand, has based part of her campaign on the risk of the far-right entering government, presenting the vote as a choice between her and Åkesson.
The very loss of centrality of crime and immigration during the campaign could have penalized the SD, which had built much of its growth on these issues. The vote can thus also be interpreted as a sort of referendum on the possibility of bringing Åkesson's party directly into government for the first time, after four years of external support for the center-right government.
The center-left had entered the final weeks of the campaign with a lead that polls had put at as high as ten points, but the margin has gradually shrunk to 0,3% in the latest survey. The race has thus become a much more uncertain contest, while Andersson has denounced a "dirty" campaign marked by many lies.alarm about Russia It entered its final phase after an SD official was exposed for her ties to circles close to the Kremlin.
Now, the final numbers and, above all, the negotiations will determine who can form the next government. The far-right is retreating, but remains central to the parliamentary balance; the Social Democrats are leading, but have yet to secure a majority. Sweden thus enters a negotiating phase in which even a few seats can make a difference.
