Tue Oct 01 00:07:03 UTC 2024: ## Austria’s Right-Wing Party on Track for Historic Victory in Election
Vienna, Austria – Austrians voted in a general election on Sunday, with the far-right Freedom Party (FPOe) poised for a historic victory, narrowly defeating the conservative ruling party. Preliminary projections show the FPOe leading with 27% of the vote, marking a significant comeback for the party despite previous stints in government.
Herbert Kickl, who took over the FPOe in 2021, has seen the party’s popularity surge amidst rising concerns over immigration, inflation, and anger over Covid restrictions, a trend mirroring the rise of far-right parties across Europe.
“I have a good feeling about today. I believe the vibe is right, and that vibe will translate into votes,” Kickl told reporters after casting his vote. He pledged to deliver “five good years” for Austria.
The ruling People’s Party (OeVP), currently at 25%, has narrowed the gap in recent weeks by focusing on its promise to provide “stability instead of chaos.” “Problems can be solved much better with confidence than with fear,” Chancellor Karl Nehammer said after voting in Vienna.
The polls opened at 7:00 am (0500 GMT) and closed at 5:00 pm. Projections are expected to be announced shortly, based on postal voting and early returns from polling stations. More than 6.3 million of Austria’s 9 million people are eligible to vote.
“The FPOe is primarily about fear-mongering and never contributes anything constructive,” Theresa Friesacher, a 29-year-old researcher, told AFP after voting in Vienna.
The FPOe’s first government in 2000, alongside the conservatives, sparked widespread opposition and sanctions from Brussels. Since then, far-right parties have gained ground across Europe, often fueled by public frustration with governments’ handling of crises like the Covid-19 pandemic and the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
Kickl was energized by his supporters at the FPOe’s final campaign rally Friday in front of Vienna’s main cathedral. Walter Gerhardt Pyrandie, a café manager, told AFP that Kickl’s “unpretentiousness” appealed to him, describing him as “a big exception” among politicians who are “generally arrogant or corrupt.”
In his speech, Kickl harshly criticized the EU’s economic sanctions against Russia, championed the far-right concept of “resettlement,” which calls for expelling non-European people deemed not integrated, and expressed anger toward the outgoing government.
Austria, along with Germany and Sweden, was a preferred destination for refugees during the peak of the 2015 migrant crisis.
The OeVP has seen its support decline from over 37% in the last national elections in 2019. Their junior coalition partner, the Green Party, is currently polling at around 8%, almost half of their 2019 performance.
While the FPOe is expected to win more seats, analysts largely anticipate they will need coalition partners to govern. Nehammer has repeatedly ruled out working under Kickl, who has dubbed himself the future “Volkskanzler,” or people’s chancellor, a title previously used by Adolf Hitler in the 1930s.
A potential scenario could see Kickl break the deadlock by forming an unprecedented three-party coalition with the OeVP and the liberal NEOS, which is polling above 20%.
If the OeVP wins the most seats or performs strongly like the FPOe, analysts see a possibility of a coalition with the far-right party as a junior partner.
“Austrian political memory is very short. I expect it to come down to an OeVP-FPOe coalition, which is worrisome,” said health consultant Bernd Lunglmayr to AFP in Vienna before voting.
Past OeVP-FPOe governments have been short-lived. The last one, led by the then-charismatic OeVP leader Sebastian Kurz, collapsed in 2019 after just 18 months in office following a sprawling FPOe corruption scandal.
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