Austrian far-right wins preliminary elections

[DraganOfStip]

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-04-25/austrian-far-right-triumphs-in-presidential-election/7354406

Austria's anti-immigration far-right has triumphed in the first round of presidential elections, in a historic defeat for the traditionally powerful governing coalition parties two years before the next scheduled general election.

Norbert Hofer of the Freedom Party (FPOe) won 36 per cent of the vote, preliminary results showed, with candidates from the two governing parties failing to even make it into a second-round runoff on May 22.

"This is the beginning of a new political era," FPOe leader Heinz-Christian Strache said after what constitutes the best-ever result at federal level for the former party of the late Joerg Haider, calling it a "historic result".

"One thing has become clear here — a huge and massive dissatisfaction with the Government … I am convinced that as president, Norbert Hofer will act as protector of the Austrian people."

The result means that for the first time since 1945, Austria will not have a president backed by either Chancellor Werner Faymann's Social Democrats (SPOe) or their centre-right coalition partners the People's Party (OeVP).

The centre-right OeVP's candidate Andreas Khol came equal fourth with 11 per cent, level with the SPOe's Rudolf Hundstorfer.

[DraganOfStip]

Update:
After Sunday's second leg of the elections,the independent candidate (formerly from the Greens) Alexander Van der Bellen beat the far-right leading candidate from the first leg Norbert Hofer in the race for Austria's presidential seat by a narrow margin of just 31 000 votes from a 4,64 million voters electoral body.
Europe won't be getting it's first far-right head of state since WWII after all.

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