Austria vote will bring more of the same, experts say

Jul 9, 2008, 4:38 GMT

Vienna - With the words 'it's enough,' Vice Chancellor Wilhelm Molterer ended his People's Party's coalition with the Social Democrats on Monday.

But experts say the likeliest scenario after elections in September is yet another coalition between Austria's two biggest parties.

With both parties hovering around 30 per cent in the latest polls, no other combination would guarantee a majority in parliament, except a coalition with the far-right Austrian Freedom Party.

But both social democrats and the conservative People's Party have declared that they will not form a cabinet with the anti-EU and anti- immigration movement.

So-called 'grand coalitions' between the moderate left and right have ruled Austria on and off for 31 years since World War II.

After the 2006 elections, the social democrats and the conservatives emerged as the only two parties with enough seats in parliament to form a stable cabinet. The same could happen after the next vote on September 28.

'No, that's not what voters want,' said Fritz Plasser, professor of political science at the University of Innsbruck. Austrians wanted a real change in politics, but there were few realistic alternatives, he said.

Since its inauguration 18 months ago, the cabinet of social democratic Chancellor Alfred Gusenbauer failed to reach agreement on key issues such as pensions, health care and administration reforms, as both parties frequently blocked each other's proposals.

According to a poll published by the daily Oesterreich on July 4, support for the People's Party stands at 32 per cent, and the Social Democrats stand at 28 per cent.

The right-wing Freedom party could emerge as the winner of the September vote. The movement scored 19 per cent in the poll, compared with 11 per cent in the last elections.

The Green party is currently supported by 15 per cent of the voters. The right-wing right-wing Alliance for the Future of Austria, with its former leader Joerg Haider, currently stands at four per cent, the threshold for re-entering parliament.

But even such a high gain in votes might not be enough for the Freedom party to form a coalition with either social democrats or conservatives, since both have expressed their unwillingness to share power with the right wing.

'Unless the Green party gets an enormous boost and as long as the Future Alliance of Austria is marginalized, there will be another grand coalition. And the country remains at a standstill,' the liberal daily Der Standard predicted in its Wednesday edition.

Although the right-wing party would not be included in the next government, 'we will have a clearly weakened coalition confronted with a clearly strengthened opposition,' Plasser said.

The Freedom Party, and the Alliance for the Future of Austria, are expected to lead election campaigns that play on Austrians' strong scepticism towards the European Union and EU enlargement.

Despite the right wing's anti-EU stance and the social democrats' recent announcement in support of referendums on future EU treaties, experts don't expect the entire electoral race to turn into a negative debate on the European Union.

For the social democrats, the EU debate 'will not play a role, because there is nothing to gain from it,' said Sieglinde Rosenberger, a political science professor at the University of Vienna.

Rising prices, the state of the economy, social policy and the mounting problem of care for the elderly are going to be the main topics in the weeks leading up to the vote, Plasser expects.

If the elections do result in a new grand coalition, new faces on both sides would be needed to make it work, experts say.

On the social democrats' side, Werner Faymann was presented as the top candidate on Monday, replacing unpopular Chancellor Gusenbauer.

If the conservatives do not manage to get more or at least the same amount of votes as in the last elections, Vice Chancellor Molterer's days may well be numbered.