Austria on path to broad coalition

The People's Party named 40-year-old Josef Pröll as leader late on Monday after the far-right made big gains in Sunday's parliamentary election at the expense of the centrists.

Unlike outgoing chief Wilhelm Molterer, Proell has a good rapport with Social Democrat head Werner Faymann, who is expected to be asked to form a government.

"I've always said that I can work well with him and now we can try and prove that," Faymann, whose party won the most votes on Sunday, told Austrian radio on Tuesday.

The Social Democrats and conservatives had ruled in a quarrelsome coalition that lasted less than two years before collapsing in July, triggering the election.

Both parties plunged to their worst results since World War Two, while the far-right Freedom Party and splinter Alliance for Austria's Future, led by former Freedom leader Jörg Haider, garnered nearly a third of votes between them.

A grand coalition has only recently become such an unpopular governing style. The vast majority of Austria's previous governments were broad-based, favoured by voters because they were seen bringing consensus and stability.

The outgoing government was particularly damaged by personality clashes rather than fundamental policy disputes.

Fresh start

But while a hard-right government with the conservatives now seems less likely, it would be a mistake to see the left-right coalition as a done deal, said political analyst Peter Hajek.

"Josef Pröll thinks of himself as a grand-coalition builder. But the People's Party has often suddenly changed its mind, so I can't be sure," he said.

Political analyst David Pfarrhofer said a remake of the centrist coalition would have to show significant differences from the last to convince a public that came to despise it over the past two years. "Above all, the style has to change. There is a lot of discontent. People don't want quarrels, they want a government," he told Austrian radio.

The main parties have been hit by voter frustration over their bickering and concern at a looming economic downturn, inflation and immigration -- a mix which allowed the far right to make significant gains. But Pröll's appointment could mark a fresh start for the conservatives.

His leadership marks the end of former Chancellor Wolfgang Schüssel's reign at the People's Party. Schüssel had led the conservatives into a coalition with the far-right Freedom Party in 2000 and to a major election victory in 2002.

While he stood down as party chief after a poll defeat in 2006, he was widely seen as the mastermind behind his party's destructive role that fuelled the feuding in the last government and eventually led to its collapse and the early election.

Austrian President Heinz Fischer on Tuesday re-appointed the outgoing government in a caretaker capacity after it collectively resigned. The procedural move is a standard formality in Austria following an election. The government is due to stay in charge until the next government is voted in by the newly elected parliament.

30.09.2008 17:55:29