Switzerland’s Center Alliance said it won’t challenge the Free Democrats for a second seat in the executive, even after likely winning more seats in parliament.
The country’s seven-member government is typically made up of representatives of the top four parties, with the first three receiving two seats each and the fourth-largest just one. National elections on Sunday saw the centrists winning 30 seats in the lower house according to projections. That would put them in third place, ahead of the pro-business FDP.
“We have always said: Sitting government members, who want to do another term, will be confirmed by the Center Alliance,” Gerhard Pfister, who heads the group, a merger between two older parties including the Christian Democrats, told public broadcaster SRF.
That suggests that both FDP ministers — Karin Keller-Sutter, who is in charge of finances, and Ignazio Cassis, who oversees foreign policy — are on track for confirmation when lawmakers vote on a new government on Dec. 13.
FDP President Thierry Burkart embraced the same sentiment as Pfister. “I’d stick with the way we’ve always done it: sitting ministers aren’t voted out of office,” he said.
Swiss voters gave the right-wing People’s Party one of its best results ever. The SVP — as the party is known by its German acronym — is set to win 29% of votes, up from 25.6% four years ago. That gives it 61 seats in the lower house. The Social Democrats remained in second place.
Many upper house seats — where the Center Alliance currently is the largest fraction — will only be decided in runoff votes next month.
