When Sweden’s prime minister Magdalena Andersson made her first post-election appearance, she insisted the victor was “not a party or a candidate, but democracy”.
That was one way of looking at Sunday’s photo-finish, which many others have seen as a victory for Sweden’s right-wing bloc, in particular the far-right populist Sweden Democrats (SD).
The race to secure a parliamentary majority has never been tighter and while the centre-left group took 48.8 per cent, with 95 per cent of the votes counted it finished 0.8 per cent behind the centre-right bloc on 49.7 per cent.
If confirmed this would mean a change of government with the centre-right securing the 175 seats needed for a majority in the 349-seat Riksdag parliament.
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Though final results are unlikely before Wednesday, when the foreign vote has been counted, SD leader Jimmie Akesson claimed victory for taking his party into the heart of Swedish politics with 21 per cent support.
“We have gone from the small party everyone laughed at to second-strongest party,” said the 43-year-old leader. “We will take a central position. We want to sit in government.”
Just 12 years after it first scraped into parliament with 5.7 per cent, a wave of shootings and other violent crimes saw a record number of voters back the SD’s radical, “net zero immigration” promises.
When polls closed on Sunday, early projections saw an apparent victory for Sweden’s governing centre-left bloc.
While Ms Andersson’s Social Democrats gained support to just over 30 per cent, however, a slide in support for traditional leftist allies — and a three-percent surge for the rival camp — saw a late-night shift.
Post-election analysis showed why: after welcoming half a million asylum seekers in the last decade, the SD capitalised on fears of crime and welfare fraud to pull in working class voters from both the Social Democrats and the centre-right Moderates.
While both toughened up their rhetoric on the campaign trail, many voters appeared to choose the migration-critical original and the SD.
A party that previously had links to fascist and neo-Nazi movements made a softer, ethno-nationalist pitch to voters. It softened a traditional anti-Islam and anti-EU message to broaden their appeal as the natural defender of hard-working voters and “svenska fliten” or Swedish industriousness.
Maintaining their hard law-and-order message chimed in a country that has seen 273 shootings so far this year, 47 of them fatal and with 74 people, including bystanders.
“The most important issues debated, in particular gang crime and shootings benefited the SD,” said political analyst Fredrik Furtenbach, “while the debate over electricity prices and nuclear power benefited the Moderates.”
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For the third-placed Moderates and its leader Ulf Kristersson, the election result creates a huge dilemma. Determined to be Sweden’s next prime minister, Mr Kristersson said during the campaign he was open to accepting opposition support of the populist SD on issues of common interest, in particular immigration and law-and-order.
Agreeing to the SD demand of a formal coalition, however, would alienate other right-wing and liberal allies and shatter a taboo of post-war Swedish politics.
Like Mr Kristersson, Social Democrat leader Ms Andersson, a 55-year-old economist who became Sweden’s first female prime minister last November, says she is ready to form a stable and effective government and conclude Sweden’s accession to Nato.
With just 50,000 votes between the two blocs, political analysts do not expect a dramatic swing in support leftwards when belated postal and foreign votes are counted.
If anything, based on the 2018 poll, non-resident voters are more likely to vote for centre-right parties than the left.
On Sunday evening Ms Andersson insisted she would not concede until Wednesday’s final result, asking for “patience” to “let democracy run its course”.
After a torrid and unstable two terms, analysts say the departure of the Social Democrats into opposition is unlikely to create any more stability in Swedish politics.
Smaller right-wing parties, in particular MPs from the Liberals, are staunchly opposed to giving the SD cabinet posts — and insist the far-right must remain in opposition. In response, SD officials insist this will drive up the price of their support on core political demands.
As Sweden prepares to take over the EU presidency in the new year, voters appear to have voted for change, but may have some time to wait before they get it.