Sweden's centre-left edges ahead as final election count looms

Sweden's centre-left opposition appeared poised to form the next government on Monday, after preliminary election results gave it a narrow three-seat lead over the right-wing bloc with most votes counted.

The election authority projected that parties backing Social Democrats leader Magdalena Andersson would take 176 seats in the 349-seat parliament, while Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson's right-wing bloc was seen winning 173. The two sides were separated by roughly 0.4% of the vote.

"If this result remains valid, Sweden will get a new government," Andersson told supporters on Sunday night.

Party leaders have been cautious about claiming victory or conceding defeat, however. Votes from 353 election districts are still to be counted, and overseas ballots are not expected to be tallied until Wednesday. In 2022, early exit polls pointed to a narrow centre-left win that ultimately proved premature, and Kristersson showed no sign of conceding after Sunday's vote.

An opposition victory would reverse the rightward shift of the past four years, which turned Sweden from one of Europe's most welcoming countries for immigrants into one of its strictest asylum regimes. Analysts say a centre-left government may soften that stance but is unlikely to restore the open-door policies of earlier decades. It would also maintain Sweden's pro-Western and pro-Ukraine position.

Forming a government could prove complicated. Andersson has not said how she would unite a divided centre-left behind her. The Centre Party has refused to share power with the Left Party, which insists it must be part of any coalition.

"The most likely outcome is a government led by the Social Democrats," said Niklas Bohlin, a political scientist at Mid-Sweden University. "Exactly what that government will look like is far less certain."

Parliament speaker Andreas Norlen told Swedish television that government formation "could very well be a complicated process."

Andersson has promised more spending on welfare, a fairer tax system and a focus on social cohesion. The Greens and Left parties want higher contributions from the wealthy, while the Centre Party opposes a billionaires' tax. On migration, the Social Democrats want to keep Sweden's tough line, putting them at odds with the Left and Green parties, which want to ease the rules.

Asylum numbers have fallen to a 40-year low under the current government, which has abolished permanent residency for refugees, tightened welfare rules and stepped up expulsions of those without the right to stay.

The far-right Sweden Democrats, which has roots in the neo-Nazi fringe, lost an estimated 11 seats, projections showed — the first decline in its vote share since it entered parliament in 2010. The election had pitted a fragmented centre-left against a united centre-right bloc that overhauled immigration and criminal justice policy and planned to bring the Sweden Democrats into government, a step too far for some voters.