Iceland’s social democratic opposition has emerged victorious in the early parliamentary elections held this past Saturday in the country, the result of which has harshly punished the ruling bloc in the midst of a housing crisis scenario in the country.
The Social Democratic Alliance (Samfylkingin), led by economist Kristrún Frostadottir has taken 15 of the 63 seats in the Icelandic Parliament by collecting 20.8 percent of the vote, one seat more than the conservative Independence Party of the current Prime Minister, Bjarni Benediktsson (19.4 percent of the vote, for a total of 14 seats).
Although it has obtained only one seat less, the election result represents a hard blow for a conservative partytraditional dominator of national politics, which has seen only a quarter of the votes received in the 2021 elections.
The reproach of the Icelandic citizenry has been extended to Benediktsson’s coalition partners: The centrist Progressive Party received 7.8 percent support, while the Left Greens fell short of the 5 percent parliamentary threshold at 2.3 percent, according to estimates by Icelandic public broadcaster RUV.
It must be remembered that Being the most voted party in Iceland does not grant the winner the automatic opportunity to form a government and it could happen that the next Executive could end up formed without the participation of any party from the previous government, something that has happened only twice in the history of the republic, excluding specific and short-term minority governments.
The also opponent Liberal Reformist Party, which occupies third place with 15.8% of the votes, largely agrees with the Social Democrats on closer cooperation with the European Union and, similarly, promises to impose a resource tax on the fishing and energy sectors. The duo are thought likely to try to form an alliance, although they will likely still need other coalition partners, according to Bloomberg analysts.
Frostadottir has been hugely skeptical about the possibility of calling on the Independence Party to form a government. ““I think many things are going to have to change in that game if they want us to talk to them.”has expressed this past electoral dawn, a social democratic victory that has not occurred since 2009.
