Stockholm, Sweden- A four-party opposition coalition, the Sweden Democrats, led by Jimmie Åkesson, has narrowly won a majority in the Swedish Parliament.
With just a handful of votes remaining to be counted four days after Sunday’s close-call vote, the right-wing bloc is on track to win 176 seats to the left-wing’s 173.
However, the narrow majority enjoyed by the right, promises to make any future government fragile and vulnerable to individual Parliamentarians voting with their conscience.
Meanwhile, Swedish Prime Minister Magdalena Andersson, leader of the Social Democrats (SD) on Wednesday announced that she would resign.
“So tomorrow I will hand in my resignation as Prime Minister, and the responsibility for the continued process will go to the Speaker,” said Andersson.
The post of Prime Minister will in all likelihood go to the leader of the Moderate Party, Ulf Kristersson, as Sweden Democrats leader, Jimmie Akesson is unable to unite all four parties to head the government.
“I will now start the work of forming a new government that can get things done, a government for all of Sweden and all citizens,” said Kristersson.
Sweden has become one of Europe’s most ethnically mixed nations since large-scale asylum-based immigration first began in the 1990s and accelerated sharply following the collapse of the Arab spring. For many years, the Sweden Democrats stood alone as the only party opposing immigration, which the party links to the recent rise of gun and gang criminality among second-generation immigrant youth in Swedish cities.
After years of welcoming more migrants than any other nation in Europe, Stockholm has finally acknowledged it can neither support them financially nor force them to conform to its laws, driving the once-hospitable Swedes into the arms of the growing anti-immigration movement. Andersson admitted earlier this year that integration of migrants was “too poor” and the society tasked with enforcing order “too weak” following violent riots in numerous cities triggered by an anti-Muslim politician’s Quran-burning publicity stunt. The country’s immigrant population has doubled over the last 20 years and now constitutes a fifth of the Swedish population, a figure over 40 percent of Swedes considered too high when surveyed in 2016.
Immigration is not the only issue that drove voters to kick the SD out after eight years in power. Like the rest of Europe, Sweden is in the midst of an economic crisis and may face a recession as soon as next year.
