Swedish PM Kristersson resigns after election loss
Left-wing opposition parties led by Magdalena Andersson look set to form the next government.
Swedish PM Kristersson steps down after election defeat
Sweden’s Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson has stepped down after his governing right-wing bloc was narrowly beaten by the centre-left opposition in the country’s general election.
He announced the move in a post on X on Thursday afternoon, after preliminary results from Sunday’s vote showed the two blocs were separated by about 50,000 votes in the nation of roughly 10 million people.
Opposition parties led by Magdalena Andersson of the Social Democrats are on course to take 176 seats in the 349-seat Riksdag, Sweden’s parliament.
Kristersson, a conservative, had relied in government on the anti-immigration hard-right Sweden Democrats (SD), and had promised them cabinet posts if he won the election.
According to data from the Swedish Election Authority, his right-wing bloc is expected to secure 173 seats in the Riksdag.
The outcome will still need formal certification in the coming days and is expected to be finalised this weekend.
Sweden has two main political blocs — four parties on the right and four on the left — so coalition and minority governments are familiar to Swedes.
Andersson has begun talks with the other opposition parties — The Left Party, The Centre Party and The Green Party — about forming a government.
However, negotiations could take time because of significant disagreements between the parties on issues including taxes.
After Sweden’s 2022 election, it took 37 days to form a government, while in 2018 it took 134 days.
Sweden’s centre-left opposition, led by the Social Democrats’ Magdalena Andersson, has defeated the right-wing governing bloc.
The right-wing bloc consists of Kristersson’s Moderates, along with the SD, the Christian Democrats and the Liberals.
The SD had provided outside support to the current centre-right coalition, which had overseen a sharp tightening of migration policy. Kristersson had promised to bring them into government if he stayed in office.
But in a surprise setback for the party, it lost support for the first time since entering parliament in 2010 — down three percentage points from 2022.
A preliminary vote count began after polls closed on Sunday evening and continued into this week.
On Wednesday, election committees started counting late-arriving early votes, as well as ballots from abroad that had not reached the country before election day.