Sweden’s immigrant party wins seats in 2 cities

By Leila Nezirevic

LONDON (AA) - Sweden's immigrant party Nyans has won seats in two Swedish cities, according to the latest election results on Wednesday.

So far, the Nyans, established in 2019, managed to secure a mandate in Botkyrka (Stockholm) and Landskrona.

Nyans received 2.49% of the votes in Landskrona while in the Botchurch Municipal Council it has secured 2.03% of the votes which means that it will enter the two councils.

The Nyans party is currently missing 300 votes to secure a seat in Malmo, but this could change as the party has launched a complaint and requested a recount in Malmo due to irregularities.

"It feels very exciting to have the opportunity to influence and see how the political work is done in the municipal council," said Sead Busuladzic, Nyans board member and the party’s leader for Sweden’s southernmost Skane county.

During the election campaign, the party focused on issues affecting minorities.

It is in Landskrona's most immigrant-dense neighborhoods Norrestad and Dammhagen that the party received the most votes.

Busuladzic pointed out that the party plans to address issues that are important to immigrant communities.

"With a mandate, you don't get much influence, but we want to pursue issues of integration and segregation with more meeting places where prejudices can be broken," he said.

Sweden’s immigrants historically tend to vote for the Social Democrats, however this time around, the Nyans took over a large portion of votes in the municipal elections in Malmo and Gothenburg.

The party collected 30.9% of the vote in Rosengard Malmo just behind the Social Democrats with 38.3%.

Busuladzic thinks that the incidents of burning the Muslim holy book of Quran and issues with social services taking away Muslim children from their families as well as racism, unemployment, low wages, and a feeling of exclusion have led to Social Democrats losing immigrant votes to Nyans.

"They don’t feel like they belong in the country, they don’t feel that the parties represent them, so they don’t feel that they are involved in the politics,” he added.