STOCKHOLM — Sweden’s right-wing opposition bloc narrowly led a general election late Sunday, according to reports from the country’s 6,578 polling stations, edging in front of the incumbent Social Democrat-led government after a tightly fought election campaign
dominated by the issue of rising gang violence.
After a nail-biting count, which initially favored the incumbent center-left government, opposition parties supporting center-right Moderate Party leader Ulf Kristersson to form a new government secured 176 of 349 seats in parliament.
Parties supporting incumbent Social Democrat Prime Minister Magdalena Andersson won 173 seats.
The extremely narrow gap between the two sides — 0.9 percentage points or around 50,000 votes — means postal votes and ballots from abroad could still decide the election, so a final result might not be available until Wednesday, Sweden’s election authority said. Neither side claimed victory on the night.
But late on Sunday, Kristersson was in pole position to form a new government. While his Moderate Party slightly underperformed its allies the far-right Sweden Democrats (SD), with 19 percent and 20.7 percent of the votes respectively, Kristersson has been backed by the right-wing coalition — which also includes the Christian Democrats and Liberals — to be the next prime minister.
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