Sweden holds elections expected to boost anti-immigration party

Sweden is holding an election expected to boost a populist anti-immigration party that has vowed to crack down on gang violence that has shaken many people’s sense of security.

The Sweden Democrats won parliamentary seats for the first time in 2010 and have steadily gained more votes in parliament with each election. The party’s fortunes have risen in recent years with mass immigration, especially in the European crisis year of 2015, and increased crime in apartheid communities.

The populist party was founded decades ago by far-right extremists but has struggled to change its image in recent years. For years, voters found it unacceptable, while other parties shunned it. Now that’s changing.

Opinion polls ahead of the vote expected the Sweden Democrats, which won 13 percent in 2018, to gain about 20 percent of the vote this time around, making them the second-largest party in parliament. That would only put it behind Prime Minister Magdalena Anderson’s centre-left Social Democrats.

Md Andersson enjoys high approval ratings. Less than a year ago, the 55-year-old woman became Sweden’s first female prime minister and served as the country’s prime minister when Sweden’s historic NATO membership following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Zeth Isaksson, a sociologist at Stockholm University who specialises in electoral behaviour, said her profile was aided by her experience in government, first as finance minister, including through the Covid-19 pandemic crisis, and negotiations to join NATO during his tenure as Prime Minister.

“Magdalena Anderson was one of the most important factors in this election,” he told The Associated Press.

But many voters are also fed up with her party of eight years in power, blaming high taxes and a failure to stop the shootings that have made Sweden one of the most violent countries in Europe.

“She’s had eight years to do everything she’s said to do now,” said Bosse Adolfsson, a 70-year-old partially retired electrician who attended a Sweden Democrats rally Saturday night. “She asked to do nothing for another four years.”

There are two main blocs: one with four parties on the left and the other with four on the right. Opinion polls ahead of the election showed that the groups were neck and neck.

Even if Ms Anderson’s party wins the most votes, she may not be able to form a government with a majority in parliament if the left-wing bloc underperform. In this case, it would go to the second-placed party to get the chance to form a government.

On the eve of the vote, Ms Anderson was campaigning in Rinkeby, an immigrant-diverse suburb in Stockholm, speaking to the crowd after a warm-up performance by a Swedish hip-hop artist of Somali descent.

Ms Anderson said she was concerned about the growing popularity of the Sweden Democrats, describing it as a “far-right” party whose rhetoric and beliefs could affect people’s popularity in society.

“This could be another Sweden that we could have in four years,” she said.

Sweden Democrats wrapped up their campaign on Saturday with a loud event filled with rock music just metres from the country’s parliament building in central Stockholm.

Jimmie Akesson, the 43-year-old leader who helped transform the party’s image, addressed his supporters on a stage decorated with the party’s daisy symbol along the city’s waterfront.

The party has clearly played on social sentiment, and other parties are getting closer to its position as many Swedes feel they can no longer afford the country’s past generous refugee policies. Rising crime rates under eight years of leftist rule are also persuading some to give it a chance.

Tobias Andersson, a 26-year-old Sweden Democrat who is seeking re-election, said his party was unfairly characterized as racist by opponents because it was in their interests.

“When my party was founded, I wasn’t even born, and I really didn’t care who founded it. I look at the values ​​and policies we support today,” he told The Associated Press at a party rally.

He said other parties that had accused the Sweden Democrats of being racist were now “pushing the same policies themselves”.