Far-right leader pledges to ‘govern Austria honestly’
On Monday Herbert Kickl received a mandate to try to form what would be the first national government led by the far-right since the Second World War.
Austrian far-right leader Herbert Kickl said on Tuesday in his first comments after being tasked to form a new government that he aspires to “govern Austria honestly” as he prepared for talks on a potential coalition with conservatives who criticised him sharply in the past.
Mr Kickl said he is prepared for new elections if they fail.
His Russia-friendly, anti-immigration, eurosceptic Freedom Party won Austria’s parliamentary election in September but was initially shunned by other parties. Their efforts to put together a coalition without it failed.
On Monday, Mr Kickl received a mandate to try to form what would be the first national government led by the far-right since the Second World War.
That came after the conservative Austrian People’s Party of outgoing Chancellor Karl Nehammer, who announced his resignation on Saturday, made an abrupt U-turn on its previous refusal to contemplate working with the Freedom Party under Mr Kickl.
Mr Kickl, 56, made clear he has not forgotten past friction with the People’s Party. Mr Nehammer has described him as a “security risk”.
The party’s interim leader, Christian Stocker, said during the election campaign that anyone voting for Mr Kickl “is voting for five years of high risk with radical ideas”.
“Our country was driven into the wall in the past five years,” Mr Kickl said, pointing in particular to Austria’s large budget deficit and what he said was “a massive trust deficit” accumulated by mainstream parties.
He said he has “a very, very simple aim, and that is to govern Austria honestly”.
Mr Kickl said he is reaching out to Mr Stocker, “and you can believe me, that isn’t easy for me either — we have an interesting past together — but it is honest”.
Mr Kickl added he has clear expectations, including “an awareness of who won the election, and who finished second and isn’t the winner”.
He also demanded “an understanding of who is responsible for the mistakes of the past” and a partner with stable and consistent leadership.
“If this isn’t assured … I can say that’s it,” Mr Kickl said. “Then there will be new elections — we are prepared for that.”
The Freedom Party won 28.8% of the vote in September. That was a nearly 13-point gain from five years earlier, when the party was punished by voters following the collapse of a conservative-led government in which it was the junior partner amid a scandal surrounding the Freedom Party’s then-leader.
The Austrian People’s Party came in second with 26.3% and the centre-left Social Democrats, post-war Austria’s other traditional big party, were third with 21.1%.
The Freedom Party’s poll ratings have risen since the election as its rivals struggled and failed to find common ground. Surveys published in December put its support at between 35% and 37%.
Mr Kickl did not address any specific policies for Austria, a member of the European Union but not Nato, in his lengthy statement to reporters. He took no questions.
The Freedom Party is part of a right-wing populist alliance in the European Parliament, Patriots for Europe, which includes the parties of Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban and of the Netherlands’ Geert Wilders, whose party dominates the Netherlands’ new government.
Mr Nehammer has said he will step down on Friday. It is not clear who will serve as interim chancellor while Mr Kickl explores a possible coalition.
