The euphoria is gone

Controversial seat in the Reichstag: Mohamed Abdukardir Ali from Borlänge, September 21st

Suspicion of electoral fraud, illegal voter influence, possible connections to organized crime: around two weeks after the Swedish election for the Riksdag (Reichstag, the national parliament), the euphoria of the center-left alliance, the so-called left bloc, has completely evaporated. The Social Democrats, the Left Party (Vänsterpartiet), the Greens and the Center Party won a total of 176 seats in the election on September 13th, three more than the right-wing conservative so-called Tidö coalition that had previously ruled. However, until the beginning of the week there was not even a date for coalition negotiations between the parties in the center-left camp. And on Monday, the MPs from the Left Party re-elected the previous incumbent Andreas Norlén, who belongs to the conservative camp, as Parliament Speaker again instead of the Social Democratic candidate Johanna Haraldsson; The Left Party justified this by saying that forming a government could take a long time and someone with experience in this situation was the best choice. As a result, the leader of the Social Democrats, who had become the strongest party, Magdalena Andersson, declared the exploratory talks with the Left Party had failed.

Whether there will still be a center-left government depends on what the ongoing election fraud investigations reveal. New elections may have to be held in the Dalarna constituency because there was suspected heavy election manipulation, especially in the 52,000-inhabitant city of Borlänge. Actually, 30-year-old Mohamed Abdukardir Ali, in ninth place on the Left Party's list, had no chance of joining the Riksdag, especially since he has only been a party member for a year. With 648 votes, Ali, who was born in Somalia and was naturalized in February, was surprisingly elected as the new member of parliament for the Dalarna district.

On election day, undercover investigators noticed that people they were observing in connection with organized crime were actually distributing ballot papers that were supposedly checked from a car.

Twelve days before the election on September 13th, the police had received a tip that men named to them were supposed to provide voters with completed ballot papers and drive them to the polling stations, especially in the Borlänge district of Tjärna Ängar, which is known as a social hotspot. These two men were already under surveillance in connection with organized crime. The election interference case that began against her after the tip was dropped after just a few days due to insufficient evidence.

On election day, undercover investigators noticed that people they were observing in connection with organized crime were actually distributing ballot papers that were supposedly checked from a car. However, the investigative management did not authorize an immediate search of the vehicle. Witnesses from Borlänge later told reporters from the Expressen newspaper that those who accepted ballot papers also received money; The men under observation withdrew cash from an ATM several times. In some cases, potential voters were also said to have received fast food. According to the daily Dagens Nyheter, certain groups with a Somali background were specifically targeted: socially isolated women, young men who actually had no intention of voting, as well as drug addicts and the homeless.

In the Swedish electoral system, each party has its own ballot paper on which the candidates standing for election are listed. Parties are allowed to distribute these ballot papers - but there is nothing to suggest that the three suspects of election fraud now belong to a party. It is unclear where they got the ballot papers from.

At this stage of the investigation, under Swedish law, the names of suspects will not be made public. According to reports from the state television station SVT, one of them is said to have a criminal record for gang crime and to be related to Ahmed Abas Omar, the second candidate of the Left Party, whose election - to the Borlängen local parliament - resulted in irregularities. The Somali citizen Ahmed Abas Omar, elected with 343 votes, was chairman of a cultural center in Tjärna Ängar, whose municipal funding was partially stopped in 2020 after problems with applications, billing and use of funds; A later KPMG audit found serious deficiencies in both the association and the municipal processing.

A lot has been known about the new Reichstag member Ali since the election. For several years he had lived with two men who held leadership positions in a criminal network. The shared apartment was searched several times, but the investigation was not directed against Ali. However, according to Expressen and Aftonbladet, his business connections are strange: two companies that want to offer digital identity and management programs for Somalia allegedly have contacts with the Somali government, but are not known to either the Swedish development aid or foreign ministries.

There is also confusion around Ali's mandate. The Left Party had offered him a position at party headquarters with a salary corresponding to the parliamentary diet if he did not take his place in parliament. Ali instead requested two weeks' leave of absence as a member of parliament. The President of Parliament, Andreas Norlén, has to decide on this. He is having a hard time with it because, as he said, this case has no precedent, presumably because Ali is not formally considered a defendant. Ahmed Abas Omar has also not resigned from his mandate in the Borlänge local parliament, but is waiting for the results of the investigation.

Swedish crime experts such as the author Diamant Salihu, who grew up in the Borlänge district of Tjärna Ängar, have not been particularly surprised by the attempts to influence the election in the city. Already in 2017, the criminologist and sociologist Amir Rostami described in a specialist article using the example of the so-called Syrian-Aramaic mafia in Södertälje how their power was expanded into local politics and the welfare sector. People close to them had taken part in political meetings and thus found themselves on committees and board positions, meaning that illegal money could be invested in legal businesses. Rostami describes political office as a strategic resource and traces how the respective environment can mobilize voters for a particular candidate to fill important positions. These include, but are not limited to, building committees; But access to information, public money, political contacts and ultimately status can also be very interesting not only for business people, but also for criminal networks.