{"id":295787,"date":"2024-09-30T07:00:34","date_gmt":"2024-09-30T07:00:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/?p=295787"},"modified":"2024-10-01T06:31:29","modified_gmt":"2024-10-01T06:31:29","slug":"far-right-freedom-party-finishes-first-in-austrian-election-latest-results-suggest","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/?p=295787","title":{"rendered":"Far-right Freedom party finishes first in Austrian election, latest results suggest"},"content":{"rendered":"

Deborah Cole \u2013 The Guardian Sept 30, 2024<\/strong><\/h1>\n

The far right won the most votes in an Austrian election for the first time since the Nazi era on Sunday, as the Freedom party (FP\u00d6) rode a tide of public anger over migration and the cost of living to beat the centre-right People\u2019s party (\u00d6VP).<\/p>\n

The pro-Kremlin, anti-Islam FP\u00d6 won 29.2% of votes, beating the ruling \u00d6VP of the chancellor, Karl Nehammer, into second place on 26.5%, according to near-complete results.<\/p>\n

The opposition Social Democratic party scored its worst ever result \u2013 21% \u2013 while the liberal NEOS drew about 9%. Despite devastating flooding this month from Storm Boris<\/a> bringing the climate crisis to the fore, the Greens, junior partners in the government coalition, tallied 8.3% in a dismal fifth place.<\/p>\n

The Communist party and the apolitical Beer party looked unlikely to clear the 4% hurdle to representation. Turnout was high at about 78%.<\/p>\n

Profiting from a rightwing surge in many parts of Europe and taking Hungary\u2019s Viktor Orb\u00e1n as a model, the FP\u00d6 capitalised on fears around migration, asylum and crime heightened by the August cancellation of three Taylor Swift concerts<\/a> in Vienna over an alleged Islamist terror plot. Mounting inflation, tepid economic growth and lingering resentment over strict government measures during Covid dovetailed into a huge leap in support for the FP\u00d6 since the last election in 2019.<\/p>\n

Its polarising lead candidate, Herbert Kickl, who campaigned using the \u201cpeople\u2019s chancellor\u201d moniker once used to describe the Austrian-born Adolf Hitler, said he was ready to form a government with \u201ceach and every one\u201d of the parties in parliament.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have written a piece of history together today,\u201d he told cheering party supporters in Vienna. \u201cWe have opened a door to a new era.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe don\u2019t need to change our position, because we have always said that we\u2019re ready to lead a government, we\u2019re ready to push forward this change in Austria side by side with the people,\u201d Kickl said in an appearance alongside other party leaders on ORF public television. \u201cThe other parties should ask themselves where they stand on democracy,\u201d he added, arguing that they should \u201csleep on the result\u201d.<\/p>\n

Nehammer called the result, which will send shock waves through Europe<\/a>, \u201cbitter\u201d while his defence minister, Klaudia Tanner, admitted the debacle for the governing parties was a \u201cwake-up call\u201d.<\/p>\n

Because it failed to win an absolute majority, the FP\u00d6 will need a partner to govern. Unlike the other centrist parties, the \u00d6VP has not ruled out cooperating with the far right in the next government, as it has twice in the past in taboo-breaking alliances at the national level.<\/p>\n

Nehammer, however, repeated on Sunday that a scenario in which Kickl, a former hardline interior minister, became chancellor was a non-starter, setting up a potential showdown in which the FP\u00d6 would have to either jettison Kickl or take a backseat in government to win the \u00d6VP\u2019s support.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ll see in the coming weeks which is more important to FP\u00d6 voters \u2013 claiming the chancellor\u2019s seat or Herbert Kickl,\u201d the political scientist Peter Filzmaier told ORF, adding that exit polling had shown it was issues and not personalities that had motivated voters.<\/p>\n

Kickl, a bespectacled marathon runner, was a protege of J\u00f6rg Haider. The former firebrand FP\u00d6 leader and Carinthia state premier, who died in 2008 in a drink-driving crash, transformed the party founded by ex-Nazi functionaries and SS officers into the ultra-nationalist force it is today.<\/p>\n

Migrant groups have expressed fear<\/a> for the future in Austria, which critics say has failed to fully own up to its Nazi past and role in the Holocaust. Rabbi Jacob Frenkel of Vienna\u2019s Jewish Council called the election a \u201cmoment of truth\u201d<\/a>.<\/p>\n

At his final rally in central Vienna on Friday, Kickl drew cheers from the crowd railing against anti-Russia EU sanctions, \u201cthe snobs, headteachers and know-it-alls\u201d, climate activists and \u201cdrag queens in schools and the early sexualisation of our children\u201d. He hailed a proposed constitutional amendment declaring the existence of only two genders. But the biggest applause line remained his call for \u201cremigration\u201d, or forced deportation of people \u201cwho think they don\u2019t have to play by the rules\u201d of Austrian society.<\/p>\n

Nehammer actively sought during the campaign to co-opt the FP\u00d6\u2019s tough stance on immigration, which the far right hopes to bring to bear at the EU level using Austria\u2019s outsized influence in Brussels due to its geographical prominence and strong alliances. Congratulations to Kickl poured in from rightwing populist parties across Europe including Germany\u2019s Alternative f\u00fcr Deutschland and Hungary\u2019s ruling Fidesz party.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe government has drastically reduced asylum applications,\u201d the chancellor said on Thursday. \u201cBut we need more: asylum procedures in third countries before asylum seekers come through several European countries. And more: complete access to social welfare only after five years of residency in Austria.\u201d<\/p>\n

It was a remarkable comeback for the FP\u00d6, humiliated five years ago after the so-called Ibiza scandal<\/a> in which Austria\u2019s then deputy chancellor and party leader, Heinz-Christian Strache, was caught on video at a Spanish luxury resort discussing a potential bribe from a woman purporting to be the niece of a Russian oligarch.<\/p>\n

The disgraced Strache and his parliamentary leader, Johann Gudenus, who had initiated the meeting, were forced to resign, triggering snap elections in which the \u00d6VP, then led by \u201cwunderkind\u201d chancellor Sebastian Kurz<\/a>, triumphed. Two years later Kurz quit politics amid a corruption investigation.<\/p>\n

The last term has been marked by a stunning reversal for the government, an \u00d6VP coalition with the Greens, even by the baroque standards of politics in this Alpine country of 9 million. The conservatives shed 11 points in support in that time, with the FP\u00d6 leading in the polls since late 2022 and coming first in European parliament elections<\/a> in June.<\/p>\n

Coalition negotiations are expected to take several weeks before a new government is in place. Regardless of the outcome, the \u00d6VP seems poised to hold on to power, either in an alliance with the far right or an unwieldy, unprecedented three-way coalition with smaller centrist parties, similar to Germany\u2019s unpopular government. A two-way alliance with the Social Democrats could eke out a wafer-thin majority but analysts said such a pact was unlikely.<\/p>\n

Source<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Readers should note that the corporate Western media tends to characterize everything that is even moderately right-of-centre as being \u201cfar right\u201d. Nonetheless, the Freedom Party win represents part of a broader shift to the right that is happening across Europe <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":39262,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[58],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-295787","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-Current_Affairs"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/295787","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/39262"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=295787"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/295787\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":295789,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/295787\/revisions\/295789"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=295787"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=295787"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=295787"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}