Iceland’s Prime Minister Bjarni Benediktsson announced the dissolution of the current coalition government at an emergency press conference on Sunday, adding that elections would be held at the end of November.
Benediktsson told reporters that the coalition of his Independence Party (the EPP’s partner party) with the agrarian-liberal Progress Party and the Left-Green Movement, in power since 2017, had been unable to find solutions to move the coalition forward.
“I think I would be letting down the people of the country, and not least my party members, if I pretended that I could continue to lead the government,” said Benediktsson.
The ruling coalition’s approval rating has hit an all-time low recently, with the prime minister’s Independence Party, one of Iceland’s main historic centre-right parties, polling at 14%.
The prime minister said his party could no longer work with the other parties in the coalition on issues such as immigration and energy. Working with the Left-Green movement, in particular, was difficult, with Benediktsson saying that the party had “a different vision for the future” from what his party stood for.
“The decision to end the coalition was my own,” he said, adding that he still believed parliament could pass the budget before the end of the year despite the early elections.
Benediktsson will remain leader of the Independence Party and run again in November.
He will meet with Iceland’s President Halla Tómasdóttir on Monday to make his decision official.
(Charles Szumski | Euractiv.com)
Source: euractiv.com
