Refugee controversy in Sjöbo
1988 referendum about accepting refugees in Sjöbo, Sweden / From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Dear Wikiwand AI, let's keep it short by simply answering these key questions:
Can you list the top facts and stats about Refugee controversy in Sjöbo?
Summarize this article for a 10 year old
The refugee controversy in Sjöbo, Sweden are the surrounding events of the 1988 referendum that banned Sjöbo Municipality from admitting foreign refugees. In 1987, despite opposition and demonstrations, local Centre Party politician Sven-Olle Olsson (1929–2005), who was Sjöbo's municipal commissioner at the time, was successful in gaining the support of the Sjöbo municipal assembly to hold a referendum to decide if Sjöbo should ban the acceptance of foreign refugees. The controversial referendum passed with a 67.4% majority for the ban in 1988, gaining Olsson and Sjöbo much publicity in the Swedish media.[1] The outcome was heavily criticized by Swedish media and politicians (including then-Prime Minister Ingvar Carlsson).[2]
Olsson was in turn expelled from the Centre Party following the referendum which led to the forming of the nationalist Sjöbo Party (Swedish: Sjöbopartiet) in March 1991.[3] In the municipal elections the same year, the party received 31% of the votes. This led to Olsson once again becoming Municipal Commissioner, a position he held until 1998, when his party's support was reduced to 15% in municipal elections.[4] Following the Sjöbo party's loss of support, the ban was overturned by Sjöbo's municipal assembly, and Sjöbo accepted its first refugees for more than a decade in 2001.[1]