Election this week would cost Bettel majority
Prime Minister Xavier Bettel’s government would lose its one-seat majority if Luxembourg voted in an election this Sunday, according to the latest Politmonitor survey, largely because of losses from his own Democratic Party (DP) pro-business liberals.
Bettel saw his popularity plummet in an earlier survey of Luxembourgish voters after an investigative news website broke the news that he had largely plagiarised his university thesis when he was a student.
That same survey also showed that voters worried about the country's soaring housing costs, prospects for the future of children and traffic.
The coalition - which also includes the LSAP, Social Democrats and the Greens - now holds 31 seats, the slimmest possible majority in the 60-seat Chamber of Deputies. But if voters in Luxembourg were to take to the polls this weekend, the triparty coalition would only win 29 seats, according to the survey carried out by TNS Ilres polling firm for Luxemburger Wort and broadcaster RTL.
The DP would incur the heaviest losses, dropping by three seats to nine. The Greens would lose one seat - down to eight - while a two-seat gain by the LSAP would not be enough to make up for the theoretical losses.
The results came on the same day that Finance Minister Pierre Gramegna - a prominent DP politician - said he would resign in a surprise announcement.
Still, the government's arch-rivals of the CSV - easily the largest party in parliament with 21 seats - would fare even worse. The Christian-Democrat party of former Prime Minister Jean-Claude Juncker - whom Bettel pushed out of power in 2013 - would drop by six seats, the Politmonitor survey said.
Fringe parties like the right-wing nationalists of the Alternative Democratic Party (ADR) and the Pirate Party would each gain five seats, according to the 1,879 respondents in the poll, who were surveyed between November 11-19.
A full 82% of voters said they were "greatly worried" about soaring housing costs, while 61% worried about their children's future in the country, and 61% said they were very worried about the growth of traffic in the county. Just under 60% said that climate change and living costs were among the main worries.
(Additional reporting by Yannick Hansen)
The Luxembourg Times has a new mobile app, download here! Get the Luxembourg Times delivered to your inbox twice a day. Sign up for your free newsletters here.
