REYKJAVIK, Iceland — Iceland’s next leader will be an openly gay former flight attendant who parlayed her experience as a union organizer into a decades-long political career.
Both parties forming Iceland’s new coalition government support the appointment of Johanna Sigurdardottir, 66, the island nation’s social affairs minister, as Iceland’s interim prime minister.
“Now we need a strong government that works with the people,” Sigurdardottir said Wednesday, adding that a new administration probably will be installed Saturday.
Sigurdardottir will lead until new elections are held, probably in May. But analysts say she’s unlikely to remain in office — chiefly because her center-left Social Democratic Alliance isn’t expected to rank among the major parties after the election. In opinion polls, it trails the Left-Green movement, a junior partner in the new coalition.
Iceland’s previous conservative-led government failed Monday after the country’s banks collapsed last fall under the weight of huge debts amassed during years of rapid economic growth. Iceland’s currency has since plummeted, as inflation and unemployment soar.
After acting as a labor organizer when she worked for what is now Icelandair in the 1960s and 1970s, Sigurdardottir was elected to Iceland’s parliament in 1978. She served as social affairs minister from 1987 to 1994 and again from 2007 to the present.
