Denmark’s Social Democrats, led by Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen, finished first in Tuesday’s general election, but posted their weakest showing in more than 120 years, as the left-wing bloc failed to secure a majority.
With all votes counted in metropolitan Denmark, the left bloc was credited with 84 seats in the 179-seat parliament and the right with 77, while 90 are needed for a majority.
The centrist Moderate party, headed by Danish Minister of Foreign Affairs Lars Lokke Rasmussen, became kingmaker with 14 seats, and thorny negotiations are expected in the coming weeks to build a coalition government.
Photo: Reuters
Frederiksen, who has been in office since 2019, told cheering supporters that she was “ready to take on the responsibility of serving as Denmark’s prime minister again for the next four years.”
However, “there is little to suggest that forming a government will be easy,” she added.
Moments earlier, Rasmussen said he wanted to see a cross-bloc coalition — even though all three parties in Frederiksen’s unprecedented left-right government in power since 2022 lost ground in the election.
“We must not be divided. We must not be red [left-wing]. We must not be blue [right-wing]. We have to work together,” he said.
Coalition partner Troels Lund Poulsen of the Liberal Party ruled out forming a new government with the Social Democrats.
“Either we have a center-right government, or we go in opposition,” he told supporters.
Four seats in Denmark’s parliament are held by its two autonomous territories — two for Greenland, where votes have not yet been counted, and two for the Faroe Islands, where one went to each bloc.
Greenland’s main political parties all want independence, but disagree on how quickly to achieve it.
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