Norwegians, richer than ever but unhappy with high taxes, voted Monday in legislative elections seen as a referendum on use of their vast oil wealth expected to deliver a painful blow to the ruling Labour Party and strong gains for conservatives.
Braving gusty winds and chilly drizzle, voters in Oslo and the rest of the small Nordic country trooped to polling stations where some 3.3 million eligible voters were asked to cast ballots for representatives to the 165-seat parliament, the Storting.
Surveys on the eve of the vote put support for the Labour Party that dominated Norwegian politics throughout the 20th century at low levels not seen since the 1920s or earlier, with the Conservative Party trailing by a whisker and other right-of-center groups also registering solid backing.
Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg, casting his vote at an Oslo school building, admitted to feeling concerned about the results of the vote but expressed satisfaction that the Labour Party had put its best foot forward.
"I fear that the situation won't be clear" after the ballots are counted and the voting results known, he said.
"But I'm optimistic. Many hundreds of thousands of voters make their minds up only at the last minute, and we've made a good case." -- OSLO (AFP)
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