Record result for Austrian far-right in 'red Vienna'

Europe's migrant crisis helped Austria's far-right on Sunday post its best-ever election result in Vienna, although its score was weaker than predicted and the centre-left retained power in its traditional fiefdom.

Fifteen years after the Freedom Party (FPOe) under the late Joerg Haider stunned Europe by entering the federal government, the populist party won 32.3 percent of the vote in the city state, preliminary results showed.

The result for the party now led by Heinz-Christian Strache represented a rise of 6.5 percentage points compared to the last election in Vienna in 2010, when their score soared 11 percentage points.

The Social Democrats (SPOe), which have ruled 1.8-million strong "Red Vienna" uninterrupted since 1945, scored 39.4 percent, down 4.9 points, adding to a similar drop in support in 2010.

"Of course we would have preferred a neck-and-neck result, but this didn't happen. At the same time it has to be said that this is the SPOe's worst result in its history," said Strache, 46.

Opinion polls before the election had forecast a much closer result, with even a victory for the nationalist FPOe a possibility.

A major issue for voters -- mirrored across Europe -- has been the arrival of hundreds of thousands of migrants into the continent this year.

A survey released Sunday, commissioned by Austria's national public broadcaster, showed that for 65 percent of Viennese voters, the migrants crisis was a major issue in deciding whom to vote for.

The worst result was for the centre-right People's Party, the SPOe's coalition partner at federal level, which saw its score fall 5.3 points to 8.7 percent, below 10 percent for the first time -- and in fourth place behind the Greens on 11.1 percent.

- Help 'our poor' -

Austria has seen more than 200,000 migrants enter the country since the beginning of September, most of whom travel onwards to Germany or Scandinavia.

But the government still expects some 85,000 asylum claims this year, making the Alpine country of 8.5 million people one of the highest recipients in Europe on a per-capita basis.

Strache, a former dental technician, has called for Austria to copy Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban and put fences up at its borders -- something rejected by Chancellor Werner Faymann of the SPOe.

"Every property owner does this with his house, putting a fence around his garden and not leaving the doors and windows open, so unwelcome guests don't come," Strache said earlier this year.

But emulating Marine Le Pen, the head of France's far-right National Front, Strache has also toned down the anti-immigration rhetoric seen in earlier campaigns in his 10 years as FPOe chief.

Gone are the slogans vilifying Islam. The posters all over Vienna were more subtle: "Help for our poor", they declare, adding in smaller letters "Instead of open doors for economic migrants".

At the same time, Strache -- who will now turn his sights on becoming chancellor at the next general elections due in 2018 -- campaigned on traditional SPOe issues like alleviating poverty.

"He has shifted his political discourse," political analyst Anton Pelinka told AFP. "The xenophobic root was still there, but in a more latent form."
Source: AFP