Once upon a time, a far-right pariah, the Sweden Democrats’ eye kingmaker role
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STOCKHOLM, Sept 7 (Reuters) – Once shunned by mainstream parties, the anti-immigration, far-right Sweden Democrats look poised to become chief powerbrokers on Sunday, embraced by a right-wing opposition that has come to see them as key to ending nearly a decade of social democratic rule.
Its leader Jimmie Åkesson’s nationalist views and call to “make Sweden great again” coincide with populist gains elsewhere in Europe and the US and appeal to some voters who relate to his image of a Sweden weighed down by migrants.
Formed in part by activists with neo-Nazi and white supremacist ties in 1988, the Sweden Democrats have seen support grow in the 12 years since the party first entered parliament as Akesson toned down its extremist image.
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The bearded and bespectacled 43-year-old has tapped into voters’ concerns about growing gang violence, which the government says is linked to poor integration of many of the 2 million “new Swedes” who have arrived in the past two decades. Read more
Opinion polls show that Akesson’s party is at around 20%, far behind the Social Democrats but ahead of the Moderates, a traditional right-wing leader whose leader Ulf Kristersson is expected to become prime minister if the bloc wins the election on September 11. Such a win would give Akesson unprecedented influence over the new government.
“A great many Swedes are extremely tired of immigration, of crime, of electricity prices,” Åkesson told a crowd of about 700 supporters at a demonstration on August 19, held a few hundred meters from central Stockholm’s main mosque.
Having scrapped plans to leave the EU and never join Nato, the party’s hard line on immigration remains undiminished.
It has set out a 30-point program aimed at making Sweden the toughest immigration country in the EU, including legislation that allows people seeking asylum to be denied on religious or LGBT grounds.
They want to reduce economic benefits for immigrants and more and tougher police work, including visitation zones in troubled areas for house searches without concrete suspicion of crime.
Åkesson, who took to the stage at the rally last month to cheers and a fiery display, has led the party since 2005 and is credited with moving it from the fringes of Swedish politics into the mainstream.
Although it has won over some voters, the party remains deeply divided in a country that sees itself as a progressive society.
A few dozen young protesters chanted “no racists on our streets” throughout the demonstration, and police removed some of them for disturbing public order.
troubled past
Regardless of the outcome of the election, where Prime Minister Magdalena Andersson’s Social Democrat-led bloc and the right-wing opposition are running neck and neck in the latest polls, the Sweden Democrats have already changed Swedish politics.
Cracking down on immigration, breaking what was a taboo in Sweden’s political discourse just a decade ago, has forced other parties to adapt.
“It has been very clear in the last five years that the other parties have aligned themselves with us, that they have positioned themselves close to us in order not to lose more voters,” Akesson told Reuters on the sidelines of the rally.
The moderates’ Kristersson, who shook hands with a Holocaust survivor in 2018 and promised her he would never cooperate with the Sweden Democrats, said the most important thing now was to form a strong government.
“They have a very troubled past and roots and they have to take responsibility for that,” he told Reuters. “But my concern is politics. I want to solve big issues.”
Others are not so accommodating.
The Center Party, traditionally part of the centre-right bloc, has loosely aligned itself with the Social Democrats, the Greens and the Left in an attempt to keep the Sweden Democrats out of government, making its leader Annie Loof a bugbear for the far-right.
Åkesson said the right-wing bloc, which now consists of the Sweden Democrats, the Moderates and the smaller Christian Democrats and Liberals, was already broadly aligned on some key issues, such as tougher rules on immigration and law and order.
As the rally drew to a close, he invited the crowd to a dance and donned a golden hat usually worn by sports teams after winning a championship.
“This is the only party that can solve the challenges we face,” Elisabeth, a 68-year-old retired florist, said at the rally, declining to give her last name.
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Reporting by Johan Ahlander and Ilze Filks; cutting by Niklas Pollard and Emelia Sithole-Matarise
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