Swedish party suggests smaller govt to get past impasse
STOCKHOLM: Sweden’s largest centre-right party said on Friday it was prepared to form a government without other parties in its bloc, in an attempt to clear a political impasse left by last month’s inconclusive election.
Swedish Moderates leader Ulf Kristersson said the other parties could support his cabinet from outside government — in an apparent bid to get around their refusal to work directly with nationalists who currently hold the balance of power.
Other members of the centre-right Alliance bloc did not comment on the plan — which was quickly rejected by other groups.
If the scheme fails, the centreleft will likely get a chance to form a government next week. Failing that, the country could face fresh elections.
The plan followed weeks of fraught negotiations after neither Kristersson’s centre-right Alliance bloc nor a grouping of centre-left parties won enough votes on September 9 to form a majority.
The vote left the anti-immigration Sweden Democrats, which has been shunned by all other parties, holding the balance of power in a deeply divided Riksdag.
Kristersson published a long Facebook post proposing that his party form a government which other members of the centre-right Alliance block could support in votes but not have to formally join.
“Neither the Sweden Democrats nor the Left Party would be given influence over the government’s political direction,” he wrote.
Nevertheless, the Sweden Democrats or left-wing parties would at least have to agree not vote against any such minority government for it to survive. None of the other members of Alliance members — the Centre Party, the Liberals and the Christian Democrats — commented on the proposal.
Several members of the centre-left Social Democrats, which is currently in a caretaker government, dismissed the plan, saying it would depend on support from the far right.
“Kristersson is showing his true colours,” Justice and Interior Minister Morgan Johansson said in a tweet.
The Sweden Democrats, which wants substantial curbs on immigration, also appeared to dismiss the scheme.
“It feels completely unreasonable that we would allow a government that clearly declares that we won’t get any influence what-so-ever,” said party leader Jimmie Akesson. “That will of course not happen.”