Traditional parties lose in Zurich elections
Green parties have emerged as winners of Sunday’s elections to the government and parliament of canton Zurich.
The centre-right Liberal Greens nearly doubled the number of seats in parliament to 19, while their centre-left rivals, the Greens, consolidated their 19 seats and gained a seat in the cantonal government.
The small centre-right Conservative Democratic Party, standing for the first time, won six seats.
The main losers were the traditional centre-right Radicals and the Christian Democrats.
The rightwing Swiss People’s Party remains the strongest group with 54 seats ahead of the centre-left Social Democrats with 35 representatives in the 180-strong parliament.
The success of the Green parties is seen by some observers as an indirect consequence of the disaster at a nuclear power plant in Japan. Others have described the result as a sign ahead of October’s election for the national parliament.
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