STOCKHOLM, Nov 3 (Reuters) – Sweden’s parliament’s speaker said on Tuesday he had asked Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson, the leader of the Moderates party, to try to form a new cabinet despite losing his right-wing coalition’s majority in the September election.
The vote gave the centre-left opposition a majority with 176 of 349 seats in parliament, but while all four parties favour Social Democrats leader Magdalena Andersson as prime minister, they do not agree on who should be part of a new government.
• Lawmakers earlier on Tuesday rejected Centre Party leader Elisabeth Thand Ringqvist as prime minister, as widely expected, in the second of four such votes before a new election must be called
• Thand Ringqvist, whose party is parliament’s fifth-biggest, last week abandoned an attempt to forge a centrist coalition
• On October 15, parliament in a first prime minister vote rejected a bid by Andersson to form a minority Social Democrat cabinet, as widely expected
• Speaker Andreas Norlen said in a statement Kristersson was due to report back on his attempt November 10 at latest
• Kristersson told a press conference he’d attempt to form a “non-socialist” government, adding however that it would probably be very difficult
• There is little indication so far that Kristersson, whose party is the second-biggest after the Social Democrats, would be able to secure a majority, and Norlen could give the mandate back to Andersson should Kristersson fail
(Reporting by Anna Ringstrom and Simon Johnson, editing by Terje Solsvik)
