Danes Go To The Polls In Thriller Election

Copenhagen, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 30th Oct, 2022 ) :Like an episode of political drama "Borgen," Denmark's Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen is fighting to cling to power on Tuesday in a legislative election that could well crown an outsider.

In a political landscape split between 14 parties, polls suggest that neither of the two main blocs can garner a 90-seat majority in the 179-seat Folketing, the Danish parliament.

The left-wing "red bloc," led by Frederiksen's Social Democrats are polling at 49.1 per cent, representing 85 seats, compared to 40.9 percent or 72 seats for the "blue" bloc of right-wing parties.

"It's about winning the middle, because the ones who get the middle get the Prime Minister's seat," Kasper Hansen, a politics professor at the University of Copenhagen.

The new party occupying the political centre is the Moderates, founded by former Liberal Prime Minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen.

The polls indicate his party will win 10 percent of the votes or 18 seats, a fivefold increase since September -- much to the surprise of political analysts.

And Rasmussen, who boasts solid political experience, has refused to pledge support for either bloc ahead of the election.

Party colleague Jakob Engel-Schmidt said they "are ready to work with the candidate who will facilitate the broadest cooperation around the centre to implement necessary reforms".

And what the Moderates want to reform is healthcare and pensions.