ELECTIONS IN EUROPE - WHAT HAS HAPPENED SINCE


I have earlier written about the political elections in different countries in Europe this year. I believe it is very important that we all know more about what happens also politically in our partner countries.  Today I want briefly to describe what has happened until now after each election. And you will see that the present corona pandemic has had important influence in most cases.



IRELAND:


The parliamentary elections in February did not give the two old parties a majority, not even together. The big winner was Sinn Fein. But the other parties do not want to cooperate with it because of its believed relations to the IRA.  Therefore, the two big parties. Fine Gael ( the present government ) and Fianna Fail have held negotiations, also with smaller parties, about forming a coalition government.  But without result.  So many expect that new elections will be called.


HAMBURG:


The present coalition government between SPD and The Greens won the elections and intend to continue the cooperation.  But due to the present corona crisis they have postponed the negotiations about a new government programme.


SLOVAKIA:


The opposition won a clear victory in the parliamentary elections – on an anti-corruption programme. Four parties have created a centre-right government, which has 95 out of 150 seats in parliament behind it. The government started on March 21 – and the ministers came out from the meeting with the president with corona masks on their faces ( see photo ).  The prime minister is Igor Matovic. The government has right away started measures to fight the corona. And its programme will be voted in parliament next week. 


FRANCE:


The first round of the local elections took place as planned. Out of 35.000 local councils about 30.000 managed to have a winner carrying more than 50 % of the votes, so this election was final.   The second round in the remaining 5.000 municipalities, incl. Paris, has due to the pandemic been postponed until end of June.  In those elections all parties may take part again.


BAVARIA:


Also here the first round of the local elections took place as planned – with a lower turnout than usual. The second round took as planned place on March 29 – but due to the crisis it was only possible to vote by mail.  They were a big success in the sense that more voters took part.  The SPD Lord Mayor of München won a big victory. But in Nürnberg the SPD lost the post as Lord Mayor for the first time in 18 years.


The success with the voting by mail has inspired several politicians afterwards to propose that future local elections should take place only by mail.


POLAND:


The next planned interesting election is the presidential election in Poland on May 10. So far it is planned to go on with that election despite the corona.  I will come back to that.

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