Vienna’s historied Hofburg palace has seen empires come and go and on Monday it will witness another first when Austria’s far-right leader arrives for talks on forming a new government.
The 11am meeting with Freedom Party (FPÖ) leader Herbert Kickl is one President Alexander Van der Bellen had done everything in his power to avoid. On Sunday Austria’s head of state acknowledged his hand had been forced by Friday’s collapse of centrist coalition talks and Saturday’s resignation of centre-right chancellor Karl Nehammer.
A quarter century ago the FPÖ took office in Vienna for the first time – shattering a postwar taboo and triggering short-lived EU sanctions against Austria. Now the FPÖ is poised to take power again – this time as senior coalition partner.
Last September the party scored a historic election win, topping the poll with 28.85 per cent of the vote. But Austria’s president, citing the party’s apparent lack of coalition partners, handed the mandate for coalition talks instead to the second-placed Mr Nehammer and his People’s Party (ÖVP).
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Three months on, talks with the Social Democrats (SPÖ), a regular postwar coalition partner, and the untested, liberal Neos collapsed on Friday, with the Neos criticising the other parties’ lack of will for reform. Mr Nehammer’s own departure a day later killed off efforts to form a new government, sending Austria’s political centre into free-fall, with Mr Kickl watching the political chaos from the sidelines. On Facebook he commented drily: “We carry none of the blame.”
While he remained out of the media spotlight his party officials fanned out across the Austrian media to recall how their party won September’s election but was frozen out of coalition talks. Meanwhile, the centre-right ÖVP, which insisted before and after the election it would not join the far-right party as a junior coalition partner, performed a sharp U-turn.
Any government with the FPÖ in the senior role comes amid a rise in hard- and far-right forces across Europe, meaning fresh sanctions are unlikely even if the FPÖ takes the chancellery. In that case, it is not yet clear who would take on the head of government role. Mr Kickl – easily Austria’s most controversial politician – kept his cards close to his chest on Sunday. Instead of clarifying his personal ambitions – the burning question in political Vienna – the FPÖ leader accused the failed coalition partners of creating a “chaotic situation and an enormous breach of trust”.
”What’s clear is that the FPÖ was and is the only stabilising factor in Austrian domestic politics,” he wrote on Facebook. “I’m sticking with what I’ve always said: first the country and then the chancellor.” President Van der Bellen said his invitation to Mr Kickl for talks on Monday arose out of “a new political situation”.
”The voices in the ÖVP who ruled out co-operation with the FPÖ have become notably quieter,” he said. One of the loudest ÖVP critics of Mr Kickl was Christian Stocker, now the party’s interim leader. Last month Mr Stocker attacked the FPÖ leader as “someone no one wants in this republic” and of “remaining loyal to Russia”. He sounded more contrite on Sunday evening, insisting that “this is not about Kickl or me, it’s about how this country needs a stable government”.
Stability is what Austrian voters are demanding most clearly, according to political analyst Thomas Hofer. ”But the crises have come to stay and they will accompany any new federal government, regardless of what it looks like,” he said. “Decisive will be whether politicians manage to change their thinking. Voters won’t be fobbed any more with cash gifts.”
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