In Austria, the right-wing FPÖ is taking center stage when forming a government. Federal President Alexander Van der Bellen announced that he would speak to FPÖ leader Herbert Kickl about this on Monday.
After Karl Nehammer announced that he would resign as Austrian Chancellor and head of the ÖVP, the previous ÖVP General Secretary Christian Stocker (64) will take over the leadership of the party on an interim basis. The party leadership had agreed on this, as a party spokeswoman confirmed to the Austrian TV station ORF. Stocker is considered an experienced crisis manager.
Top ÖVP officials met in the Chancellery on Sunday to appoint a new party leader. They are probably looking for someone who, unlike Nehammer, is prepared to govern as a junior partner with the right-wing FPÖ, it was said from circles close to the party.
As the German Press Agency learned from former Chancellor Sebastian Kurz’s entourage, he is not available for office in the new government. Some officials in his party had hoped for his comeback. Previously they had Picture and other media have already reported on the cancellation. Kurz had led a coalition with the FPÖ from 2017 to 2019. However, people close to him said he would not be available as vice-chancellor. He is currently satisfied with his work as an entrepreneur.
A good three months after the FPÖ’s election victory in Austria, talks about a centrist government without the right-wing populists failed. The conservative ÖVP has ended its talks with the social democratic SPÖ, said Chancellor and ÖVP leader Karl Nehammer. At the same time, he announced that he would resign as government and party leader in the coming days. Only on Friday, after weeks of struggle, the liberal Neos surprisingly withdrew from negotiations with the ÖVP and SPÖ about a traffic light coalition. The two remaining parties then continued talks on Saturday afternoon. However, the negotiations ended again in the evening.
The right-wing FPÖ won the parliamentary elections in September. Nehammer wanted to forge a coalition with the social democratic SPÖ and the liberal Neos and thus keep the right-wing populists away from power. Negotiations began in mid-November. However, the project of a centrist government failed due to different ideas about how Austria’s sluggish economy should be stimulated and at the same time plug the hole in the national budget.
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