Center Party Archives • SwedeInternational

Country-city-country

A face we’ll be seeing a lot of.
Image source: https://www.centerpartiet.se/partiledarvalet/muharrem-demirok

All politics is local, it’s said. But even local politics can have national and even international angles. So it is with the election of the new Swedish Center Party leader, Muharrem Demirok. Outside of the Center party in Linköping, no one had really heard of him. All eyes are on him now, though, and not only on his Turkish citizenship but also on the fact that Center party has traditionally been a rural-based party and Demirok is a Stockholm suburbs baby.

Demirok was born in Sweden in 1976 of a Swedish mother and Turkish father. Swedish citizenship was a possibility via his mother, but dual Swedish and Turkish citizenship was not. Muharrem’s parents gave him Turkish citizenship. When he was 21, Demirok applied for and received Swedish citizenship.

The rules for citizenship are as complex as human relations are complex, and the rules change over time as well. Only in 2001 did Sweden allow dual (actually, multi) citizenship. Demirok applied for Swedish citizenship in 1997. However, since dual citizenship was allowed in Turkey, it was not a problem for Turkey that Demirok became Swedish. In its turn, Sweden probably never specifically asked that Demirok renounce his Turkish citizenship, or check that he had. Sweden at that time was already considering loosening the single citizenship rule that had been in place since 1963. It’s unclear, but having both might not have seemed to matter. Now though, Demirok has said he is formally renouncing Turkish citizenship, in response to real or imagined national security concerns evinced by Center party members and others.

Besides citizenship, a matter that concerns party members is to what degree the Center party is losing is rural voter base. The Center party has always been “the farmer’s party,” with deep roots outside of city centers. Even as late as 2017, the Center party campaigned (among other things) for increasing the number of horses in the countryside – “for every ten horses a new job is created!”.

In his first long speech as Center party leader, Demirok invoked the countryside several times, claiming “all of Sweden must live.” One of the reasons that Demirok is now party leader, though, is that his predecessor Annie Lööf led a rather unsuccessful election campaign. Many of the voters she and the Center party lost were those rural voters. Demirok will have his work cut out for him to win them back.

15 Dec. – Löfven’s Christmas speech

Löfven holding the Christmas speech on Gotland
pic: Henrik Montgomery/TT

Prime Minister Stefan Löfven held his Christmas speech today in the ruins of the Church of St. Nicholas in Visby, on the island of Gotland. The church was part of a Dominican monastery built in the 1230s, and was burnt down in 1525 by an army from Lübeck. It is unclear why the speech was held just here, but there was at least fika and a mingle in the ruins before the speech.

Löfven spoke of how the season is representative of something bigger – of caring, and of not being indifferent to how others in society are faring. “When colleagues are chatting about how stressful it is to buy presents, others are wondering how in the world there will be money to buy even a single present to put under the tree for the kids” Löfven said. “That – sickness, loneliness, and poverty – can never be reduced to being one person’s problem. It is our collective responsibility.”

Löfven also threw in a note of thanks to the police and nurses who will be working during the holiday. “Many of us can be relatively free over the holidays, while nurses and the police continue working. They celebrate without their families so that we can be secure while celebrating with ours.”

A few pointed political comments were also thrown in, in a change from last year’s speech. Regarding the challenges forming a government after the results of the 2018 election, Löfven exclaimed that “We still succeeded in building a government led by the Social Democrats. Not least after brave decisions by the Center and Liberal parties, who chose to stand on the right side of history.”

Löfven also pointed a finger at the Moderate party leader Ulf Kristersson, SvD reports, saying that he had betrayed his promise not to cooperate with the Sweden Democrats: Kristersson only said that to keep the old Alliance parties together, Löfven claimed. It was also, Löfven expounded, “morally reprehensible” to have said to a Holocaust survivor that they would not cooperate with SD, and the turn around and do it” speaking of Kristersson’s meeting with Hédi Fried in June of 2018, and then his lunch with Jimmie Åkesson earlier this month.

Löfven also spoke the need for fast integration, and about the fight against crime. “Crime doesn’t have anything to do with the color of one’s skin or one’s religion, but with social class (samhällsklass) and a feeling of community (gemenskap).”

He also promised more money would be coming to the municipalities around Sweden. “We will not desert any municipality, any region, any part of the country. This means that we need to hold together” (SvD.se/julspeech).

9 Dec. – political Twister

strange political twists
pic: amazon.com

As expected, the government and its partners, the Center and Liberal parties, agreed today to postpone and rethink the Employment Service’s reform and privatisation. As written about in this post and this post, Jonas Sjöstedt threatened to bring a vote of no confidence to the floor if the government didn’t stop the reform. The Sweden Democrats (SD), as well as the Moderate and Christian Democratic parties, hopped on the Left party’s train. This was an unexpected development for the government, never having imagined these parties to side with each other on anything.

After a weekend of negotiations with the Center and Liberal parties – the Center party being the main instigator of the Service’s privatisation to begin with – the government has proposed a new timetable for the reform. As Göran Eriksson at SvD puts it, the government backed off on all the points that SD and the Moderate, Christian Democratic and Left parties agreed upon and had a majority in parliament to back it up with, but kept the points that those parties didn’t agree on and didn’t therefore have a parliamentary majority on. In other words, the government satisfied the SD, Moderate and Christian Democratic demands, but not all of the Left party’s demands. How the Center, for whom this matter was close to the heart, is going to frame the postponement remains to be seen.

The gist of the new proposal is that “the law of free system choice” (Lagen om valfrihetssystem, or LOV) will not be the only regulation implemented for employment actors ( – so not just private employment companies will be allowed to help job seekers, but also public organizations like the current employment service and even voluntary organisations can be involved). The government has also gone along with instituting a control system so that there is some kind of check on which companies are being paid from public coffers for doing what. Finally, the reform timetable is being put off a year, to 2022 (DN.se/reform).

So the government is saved, and what remains is how the parties are spinning it. Liberal party leader Nyamko Sabuni, one of the government’s supporting parties, is insisting (despite all evidence to the contrary) that the Left party had no influence over the government’s decision (according to the January agreement that allowed Löfven to hold onto power, the Left party is not “allowed” to have any influence over government policy). The Moderate party is calling the Liberal statement “nonsense“. As previously noted in this blog, Löfven is likely delighted over the postponement.

What he is likely not at all delighted about is this newfound spirit of cooperation between opposition parties with completely different political bents. It is hard to see where they might cooperate next (and they’re certainly not saying) but who knows. The Left party didn’t mind using public support from SD to get their way – gasp – which was also somewhat interesting (they didn’t have lunch or anything though). The Moderate party leader has had lunch with the SD leader Jimmie Åkesson just recently, but now has also just backed the Left party.

What bizarre political constellations can possibly follow?

29 sep. – sorry, sort of

Center party leader Annie Lööf said today that she regrets the Center party congress’s decision to work towards making circumcision illegal except when necessary for medical reasons. At press conferences today, Lööf stressed that it was not the position favored by party leadership, and that freedom of religion is really (really!) important to the Center party.

Since the current Social Democratic-led government is beholden to the Center party for its continued existence, what the Center party decides, at its congress or otherwise, matters. Perhaps decisions like these are like the Swedish expression barnsjukdomar, which means something like growing pains as the body matures, that then blow over as they grow up. The Center party has support numbers that allows them to flex some muscle – but that makes their tantrums all the more problematic.

28 sep. – Center finds the limits of its tolerance

Everyone knows that religion plus politics is a area where only angels dare to tread. And yet, the Center party at its congress today decided to do just that: it will formally and officially work towards making circumcision illegal unless medically necessary.

Circumcision is a religious obligation in two of the dominant world religions, Judaism and Islam. It’s also a widespread practice throughout the western world, and even a hospital union in Beijing (with 50 other hospitals as union members) decided only this April that they too will “popularize” circumcision at all its hospitals as a way to prevent HIV/AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases (Chinadaily.com).

The Center party has injected itself into this practice to protest the “insult” to a male infant’s integrity. Speakers for the proposal argued that there were aspects to the issue that outweigh freedom of religious expression. In fact, said the Center party’s vice chair Anders W. Jonsson, “the debate wasn’t about religion at all, it took into account a children’s rights perspective and an integrity perspective.”

Though the Center party might say it isn’t about religion, there are a whole lot of others that say it is. Mohamed Temsamani, chairman for the United Islamic Associations of Sweden, stated the the Center party decision limits freedom of religion. Further, “Muslims and Jews,” he said, “aren’t going to stop circumcising their boys. The risk is that people will be forced to do it away from prying eyes in an unsafe manner” reported Expressen. “If this were to go through” said Aron Verständig, chairman of the Council of Swedish Jewish Communities, “it would mean the end of being able to live as a Muslim or a Jew in Sweden” (aftonbladet.se).

Previously, only the Sweden Democrats and the Left party have been opposed to circumcision being legal. Now the Center party is joining their ranks.

27 sep. – no school news is good news

The Swedish public school is in the news today. Then again, when is the Swedish public school not in the news?

Today’s news on the school front is threefold: school news from the Center party congress; school news on the curriculum front; and a computer malfunction that is currently causing hundreds upon hundreds of school computers to crash.

A blog at this same location yesterday, on the ongoing Center party congress, promised updates – so here’s an update. A motion to allow uncertified teachers to give school students a formal grade at the completion of a course lost. Not by much. The vote for allowing this was lost only because the congress was split on the issue and they tossed a coin to decide.

The Center party leadership was for allowing uncertified teachers to give out grades because, they argued, there aren’t enough certified teachers around. And the work uncertified teachers do should be shown official appreciation. Plus, they would only be allowed to do it if the school principal was ok with it.

On the other hand, people who were against the motion argued that it would depreciate the quality of school education even more, it would be insulting to teachers who actually put in all the work to get a degree, and would even jeopardize the trustworthiness of a grade given in this manner.

When the motion went to vote, the results were an even 245 for, and 245 against – hence the need for a coin toss. For the DN article, click here.

In a second bit of news, although this did come out a couple days ago, there’s a suggestion from Swedish National Agency for Education (Skolverket) to stop educating kids on ancient Rome and Greece because there just isn’t time in the school year. In the Swedish school, they argue, history begins after year 1700.

In Sweden’s defense, there is a huge uproar about this, and it isn’t likely to get pushed through. This time.

Finally, school computers across the country are dying, DN reports. It started last Wednesday, when the first reports of laptop death were circulated. Since then, 750 computers have reportedly been hit, and more are expected.

The problem is a faulty drive routine that causes computer failure when restarted. The company behind the drive, Fujitsu, is working the weekend (we assume) to fix the problem. New USB drives are being distributed, but there’s no fixed date for the problem’s eradication.

There just isn’t a lot of good school news out there. Sorry.

26 sep. – party! (congress)

“locally produced politics”
pic: centerpartiet.se

The Center party’s congress began today in Karlstad, and the comments in the papers appear to be mixed. Göran Eriksson, political analyst at Svenska Dagbladet, writes that although it goes well for the Center party, the support for the four parties that together make up the united front of government is still near an all time low.

What’s also got to pinch is that the whole point behind the Center party letting the Social Democrats hold on to power was to continue to freeze out the Sweden Democrats. And yet, the Sweden Democrats are only getting stronger and more established. So that didn’t work (SVDEriksson).

What did work for the Center party was getting a whole lot of sway over the government’s policy. The Social Democrats are having to do things that they are seriously unhappy about, in particular the elimination of the extra wealth tax, but also looking over the holy grail of LAS, and cutting back on the Swedish Public Employment Service (arbetsförmedlingen). LAS, the law on employment protection (or, lagen om anställningsskydd) has been around in some form since 1974, and formed part of the very apex of dreams for a perfect society. LAS today, even in its slightly watered down form, still makes it extremely difficult to fire someone from their job. This has good sides and bad sides of course, but the Center party made it clear that their support was contingent upon allowing more exceptions to the “last in first out” employment rule. That this hasn’t happened yet doesn’t mean that the Center party is going to let it slide.

Anyway, Göran Eriksson wonders, if by their success, the Center party is losing votes for the Social Democrats – in which case, if these voters go over the Sweden Democrats – Center is contributing to the decreasing popularity of the government they went out on a limb to support. Eriksson, however, seems to be just taking it to the extreme, because it’s fun to be extreme. Voters that leave the Social Democrats because of more liberal Center politics aren’t that likely to head farther right.

The other main thing that came out of the congress’ opening shots was a jab at the former alliance parties, saying they were basically spineless for walking out on the talks on combating gang violence. Lööf said, that if parties were serious about ending shootings and violent deaths they would scrape up the courage to remain at the negotiating table and “make the decisions that need to be made.” The Center party, of course, had just that courage, and are open for continued cooperation – “building a new security for everyone” (). For some people it’s called being an enabler, but others can call it courage. What you see depends on where you stand.

The smart thing to do is not, however, to react to crowd-pleasing opening speeches (guilty as charged), but to wait and see what the summary statements have in the way of real politics. The congress has three days to go – stay tuned.

4 sep. – Center visits the country

Little foretastes of the coming national budget continue to land on the proverbial palate. Like it or not. Besides the Green Party’s “free year” and the Left Party’s bank tax, the Center Party has apparently finagled a rural tax reduction (). Almost everyone living in Norrland, Dalarna, parts of Värmland and parts of Dalsland will be able to write a bit off of their taxes because they live in a low population area, or, as they’re known in official-speak “support area A and B” (stödområden).

“It’s all about being fair, and reducing the tax difference between city and country” said Annie Lööf, Center Party leader. She also motivated the tax reduction by noting that country residents often pay some of the highest local municipality taxes but generally receive fewer services (read: a health clinic or dentist in the area, or a local unemployment office) in return.

About 830,000 people are eligible for the rebate, to the tune of about 140 kronor a month, per person. On a national level, the reduced tax is expected to cost about 2.2 billion kronor ().

Although it works out to about 1650 kronor a year, there won’t be much to it if the gas tax is raised, as is expected to happen. Living in the country means needing a vehicle, especially when the state’s services are few and far between. The tax reduction might then cover the cost of filling the tank a time or two. Only voters can decide if the trade off is a fair one.