Sweden’s Riksdag elects a moderate prime minister to lead the right-wing coalition
STOCKHOLM – Moderates leader Ulf Kristersson said on Friday that he aims to form a three-party minority government with support from the anti-immigration Sweden Democrats after the right-wing bloc won a majority in last month’s election.
The new government plans to cut taxes, start the process of building new nuclear power plants, draw benefits, tighten immigration rules and give police more powers as part of a policy deal with the Sweden Democrats.
“Change is not only necessary, change is also possible, and we four parties together can offer that change,” Kristersson, 58, told reporters.
Now the ability of Sweden’s largest right-wing party, the nationalist Sweden Democrats, to shape politics marks an enormous shift in politics and would have been unthinkable less than a decade ago.
Leader Jimmie Åkesson’s message that most of Sweden’s ills are the result of decades of overgenerous immigration policies and failure to integrate “new Swedes” has struck a chord with young voters in particular, making it almost impossible for the right-wing bloc to govern without their party’s support.
“For us in the Sweden Democrats… a shift in power must also mean a paradigm shift in terms of immigration and integration policy,” Åkesson said at the press conference.
The new government will make it more difficult for new immigrants who lack character to benefit from Sweden’s social welfare system, while the foreign aid target of 1 percent of gross national income is replaced by a fixed amount.
If you come to Sweden and are not a Swedish citizen, then you have to work, earn a living, study or contribute to society in various ways – not come to Sweden and benefit from Swedish society, said Kristersson reporters.
The police will be able to take tougher measures against criminal gangs and the penalties for gang crimes will be longer.
Challenges ahead
Kristersson won a confirmation vote on Monday. But his party’s junior status could make it extremely difficult to govern for the next four years.
He will have to rely on both the Sweden Democrats and the Liberals, and also the Christian Democrats, who strongly disagree on many policy areas. Both could pull the plug on Kristersson’s government.
Measures to address climate change must be implemented and holes in the welfare system exposed by the pandemic must be closed. A planned increase in defense spending must be financed.
Sweden is in the midst of a cost-of-living crisis and could be headed for recession next year, while Russia’s war in Ukraine has destabilized the Baltic Sea region – Sweden’s backyard. Turkey can still block Sweden’s application to join NATO.
In the September 11 election, the right-wing bloc secured a narrow majority, winning 176 seats in the 349-member parliament.
The Sweden Democrats received 20.5 percent of the vote in September, compared to 19.1 percent for the Moderates.
The government was thrown into crisis in June 2021 when Prime Minister Stefan Löfven from the left-wing Social Democrats was deposed in a vote of no confidence for the first time in Sweden’s history.
By Anna Ringström and Simon Johnson