Freeway - CATASTROPHE IN SWEDEN

CATASTROPHE ELECTION IN SWEDEN 1998

The Swedish citizens have lost their confidence in politicians. Only 81,39 per cent of the people made use of their rights to vote in the elections. The remaining citizens decided to protest by staying at home. Over 1 000 000 citizens didn't vote. Never before has a general election had a lower number of election participants than this year.

The Social Democratic party with Göran Persson as the leader hasn't pursued a policy that protects families with children and the high unemployment hasn't been reduced.
A new thing this year was the possibility to vote for a special politician which gave a few of them a seat in the Parliament. The election gave Sweden a minority Social democratic government supported by the Left party and the Environment party.

THE ELECTION

In Sweden we have our election the third Sunday in September and it takes place every fourth year. The Swedish people vote for three elections at the same time, the Riksdag which is the Swedish parliament, the County and the Municipal council.

All Swedish citizens who are 18 years old and older and are included in the electoral roll, have the right to vote in a general election.
You can vote in three different ways, at the voting-station, the post office and by a ombudsman. The majority of the Swedish people votes at the polling-station. At the post office you can vote two weeks before the "real" election day. It's very important for the democracy that every citizen who is entitled to vote, votes in the three elections. The politicians are representatives of the people and they make decisions in many difficult questions.

There are seven big parties in the Swedish Parliament which distribute 349 seats. Of the seats 310 are permanent constituency seats and 39 are equalizing seats for the country as a whole. The 39 seats are distributed one by one based on votes in the constituency. In that way we have elections which are just.

VOTE FOR YOUR FAVOURITE POLITICIAN !

1998 was the first year we had person elections. The citizens could vote for their favourite politician which could give him/her a chance to take a seat in the Parliament. All the politician needs is 5 per cent of the party's votes in a constituency.
Every person who is entitled to vote can chose between a lot of names on the voting-paper. The parties in the elections decide themselves which names they want on the voting-paper. Then the citizens can chose by putting a cross infront of the politician's name.

Göran Persson WHO WON THE ELECTION ?

In the election of 1998 the socialist bloc got 48,37 per cent of the votes which
wasn't enough to give them majority in the Parliament. After discussions with the Environment party the three parties together formed a minority government with 52,86 per cent of the Swedish citizens votes.

THE ELECTIONS, A CATASTROPHE FOR THE SOCIAL DEMOCRATS ?

The Social Democratic party was the big loser in the elections of 1998. It was the citizens penalty for the hard politics against the families with children, the unemployment and all savings in the Swedish economy. Instead many of the electors chose to vote for the Left party and the Christian Democratic party, made the best elections ever with 11,99 per cent respective 11,76 per cent of the votes. The Christian Democratic party politics reflect a Christian outlook on life and they defence of the families with children.

Maybe Sweden is going the same way as Germany and Italy which both have big Christian parties. The future will give us the answer.