Iceland votes for a recent parliament after political disagreements force an early election

REYKJAVIK, Iceland — Icelanders voted to elect a recent parliament Saturday after disagreements over immigration, vigor policy and the economy forced Prime Minister Bjarni Benediktsson to pull the plug on his coalition government and call an early election.

This is Iceland’s sixth general election since the 2008 monetary crisis devastated the economy of the North Atlantic island country and ushered in a recent era of political instability.

view polls suggested the country could be in for another upheaval, with back for the three governing parties plunging. Benediktsson, who was named prime minister in April following the resignation of his predecessor, struggled to hold together the unlikely coalition of his conservative Independence event with the centrist Progressive event and the Left-Green Movement.

“My expectation is like, something recent going to happen, hopefully,” said Hörður Guðjónsson, voting in the pool, Reykjavik. “We always have had these ancient parties taking worry of things. I aspiration we view the light now to arrive in with a younger people, recent ideas.”

Iceland, a country of about 400,000 people, is proud of its democratic traditions, describing itself as arguably the globe’s oldest parliamentary democracy. The island’s parliament, the Althingi, was founded in 930 by the Norsemen who settled the country.

Fierce weather in the sub-Arctic country threatened to hamper some voters getting to polling stations on Saturday, with heavy snow blocking roads in many areas. The weather could also delay the delivery of ballot boxes to counting centers after polls close at 10 p.m. (2200GMT).

Voters are choosing 63 members of the Althingi in an election that will allocate seats both by regional constituencies and proportional representation. Parties require at least 5% of the vote to triumph seats in parliament. Eight parties were represented in the outgoing parliament, and 10 parties are contesting this election.

Turnout is traditionally high by international standards, with 80% of registered voters casting ballots in the 2021 parliamentary election.

A windswept island near the Arctic Circle, Iceland normally holds elections during the warmer months of the year. But Benediktsson decided on Oct. 13 that his coalition couldn’t last any longer, and he asked President Halla Tómasdóttir to dissolve the Althingi.

“The weakness of this population is that we have no very powerful event and we have no very powerful chief of any event,’’ said Vilhjálmur Bjarnason a former member of parliament. “We have no charming person with a imagination … That is very challenging for us.”

Despite the electoral headwinds, Benediktsson expressed confidence that his Independence event could emerge on top.

“It was an uphill battle for my event, initially, but as we moved on into the election campaign, I ponder things started to turn our way and I feel that this will be a very exciting election day,” he said.

The splintering of Iceland’s political landscape came after the 2008 monetary crisis, which prompted years of economic upheaval after the country’s debt-swollen banks collapsed.

The crisis led to rage and distrust of the parties that had traditionally traded power back and forth, and prompted the creation of recent parties ranging from the surroundings concentrated Left-Green Alliance to the Pirate event, which advocates direct democracy and person freedoms.

“This is one of the consequences of the economic crash,’’ said Eva H. Önnudóttir, a professor of political science at the University of Iceland. “It’s just the changed landscape. Parties, especially the ancient parties, have maybe benevolent of been hoping that we would leave back to how things were before, but that’s not going to happen.”

Like many Western countries, Iceland has been buffeted by the rising expense of living and immigration pressures.

expense boost peaked at an annual rate of 10.2% in February 2023, fueled by the fallout from the COVID-19 pandemic and Russia’s packed-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. While expense boost slowed to 5.1% in October, that is still high compared with neighboring countries. The U.S. expense boost rate stood at 2.6% last month, while the European Union’s rate was 2.3%.

Iceland is also struggling to accommodate a rising number of asylum-seekers, creating tensions within the tiny, traditionally homogenous country. The number of immigrants seeking protection in Iceland jumped to more than 4,000 in each of the history three years, compared with a previous average of less than 1,000.

Repeated eruptions of a volcano in the southwestern part of the country have displaced thousands of people and strained community finances. One year after the first eruption forced the evacuation of the town of Grindavik, many residents still don’t have secure housing, leading to complaints that the government has been leisurely to respond.

But it also added to a shortage of affordable housing exacerbated by Iceland’s tourism boom. youthful people are struggling to get a foot on the housing ladder at a period when short-term vacation rentals have reduced the housing distribute available for locals, Önnudóttir said.

“The housing issue is becoming a large issue in Iceland,” she said.

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Danica Kirka reported from London. Jill Lawless contributed to this update from London.