Austrian Chancellor Christian Kern has said he expects an early election "in the autumn" after his coalition partners abruptly ended their alliance.
Austria's Chancellor Christian Kern. Photo: AFP
Austria's youthful foreign minister Sebastian Kurz took over as leader of the country's main conservative party on Sunday and called for a snap parliamentary election that center-left Chancellor Christian Kern admitted he could not prevent.
Mr Kern's Social Democrats (SPO) and Mr Kurz's conservative People's Party (OVP) are coalition partners and have dominated Austrian politics for decades, but now hav edaggers drawn.
An early election would give the far-right Freedom Party (FPO), currently leading in opinion polls, a good chance of entering national government less than a year after its candidate lost a presidential runoff.
However, some surveys have suggested the OVP would leap from third to first place if the 30-year-old Mr Kurz, who takes a tough stance on immigration, became its leader. Forming a government in Austria usually requires at least two parties.
"There will definitely... be an election, I assume in the coming autumn," Mr Kern told ORF TV. He had resisted the idea of a snap election, calling for the coalition to keep working until its term ends in more than a year's time.
Hours later, the OVP leadership appointed Mr Kurz as their leader and also handed him sweeping new powers including the ability to pick the party's list of candidates for parliament.
Mr Kurz told a news conference he would meet the chancellor on Monday and suggest they jointly propose a parliamentary election be held after the summer.
A spokeswoman for Mr Kern said the chancellor was unaware of any meeting with Mr Kurz on Monday.
Mr Kurz is a star of Austrian politics and widely seen as his party's best hope of reviving its fortunes. The previous OVP leader, Reinhold Mitterlehner, quit on Wednesday after failing to stop in-fighting among his ministers.
Macron-style
Mr Kurz plans to include people from outside the OVP in the party's list of candidates, which would carry his name and that of the "New People's Party" - a striking power grab in a country of consensus-driven politics. The move also carries echoes of new French President Emmanuel Macron's novice-heavy list of parliamentary candidates.
"We have decided that we are starting a movement, that we are relying on valued forces within the People's Party but at the same time bringing new people on board," Mr Kurz told a news conference on Sunday evening, declining to provide names.
Calling a snap election requires a majority in parliament. The FPO supports the idea - it and the OVP are three seats short of a majority.
Mr Kern, who took over as chancellor and SPO leader only a year ago, accused the OVP and Mr Kurz of failing to honor a commitment they made in January to a package of measures aimed at breathing new life into their coalition and eroding support for the FPO.
But that package failed to put an end to the squabbling that has marred the centrist coalition.
"It was the case from the first day onwards that there was a group within the OVP that wanted to work with us (Social Democrats) constructively... and then there were some who were less interested in this government succeeding. They have now prevailed within the OVP," Mr Kern said.
The package included a series of law-and-order measures such as a ban on Muslim face-covering veils in public places.
Mr Kurz has made a tough line on immigration one of his hallmarks, to the point that the FPO has accused him of stealing its ideas.
- BBC / Reuters