“The big loser of this election Sunday is the SPÖ (…) The surprise election winner is the government partner ÖVP (…), which was able to gain votes.” This is the headline of the Carinthian ORF state studio shortly after the first projections.
However, if you look at the numbers soberly, there is hardly anything left of them.
The SP around Governor Peter Kaiser cannot be satisfied with a full minus of 9.02% points, but the election losers look different. Almost 40% of the votes and more than 14 percentage points behind the second-placed FPÖ guarantee the Carinthian Social Democrats their role as the dominant force in the country.
In the case of the People’s Party, you can prevent the predicted total crash and even show a small plus in the end, but declaring the big “election victory” from third place and more than 20 percentage points behind the first is very strange.
Ex-BZÖ preferred candidate and current head of the ORF state studio Karin Bernhard would therefore do well in the analysis with a little less agenda.
The real winners and losers of the Carinthian elections are to be found this time apart from the big three: With an increase of 4.4% points and thus almost a doubling of the share of the vote, the mayor of Spittal, Gerhard Köfer and his “Team Carinthia to gain substance. Emerging from the ruins of Team Stronach, this was not foreseeable from the outset. Similar derivatives failed quickly and significantly. Köfer’s secret of success: unexcited state politics in the manner of citizens’ lists, many years of political experience and the unconditional will to take revenge on his former comrades in the SPÖ. On the way to the state party leader, the Köfer had ditched him with nasty tricks.
If the election campaign goes to the substance, something like this can work wonders. Total motivation! (And a foretaste of what the SPÖ could face at the federal level if they escalated the Rendi-Dosko conflict in a similarly stupid way.)
On the other side of the coin: Greens and NEOS. Both fail again to (re)enter the state parliament. Despite massive support from their federal parties. For the Greens in particular, this is a sign of inadequacy and probably also a small indication of what may come next. After all, the self-proclaimed eco-party was not only represented in the state parliament but even in the state government until the collapse in 2018 – in contrast to NEOS, it can look back on something of a political tradition. Nevertheless, with only 3.85%, one fell well short of the 5% required for moving in. A fiasco: Anyway. A turning point in the Green success story: maybe. It should now be clear to Kogler and Co. that climate fetishism and niche politics come to an abrupt end at the latest when majorities are at stake.
But that’s not all. In terms of democracy, too, it would hardly be enough for the Carinthian election.
With 2.37%, the MFG spin-off “Vision Austria” ended up almost level with the NEOS in the lower ranks. Only 651 votes separated the political startup around frontman Alexander Todor-Kostic and the Carinthian offshoot of the powerful pink federal party. The distance to the state Greens was a little more than 4000 votes (i.e. a small community).
For all three, however, it was said in the end: unfortunately stay outside.
In contrast to “Vision Austria”, Greens and Neos had the big stage at their disposal. As regional groups with federal party privileges, they were invited to all discussion formats, including the ORF elephant round, in order to spread their ideas to hundreds of thousands of viewers. Kostic and company were denied this chance.
A scandal. Naturally. Unfortunately, this is no exception in the state of Austria. According to the motto “whoever has, will receive” the political-media complex seals itself off from the outside world. Additional competition is seen as a danger instead of an enrichment – new ideas are suppressed instead of looking for a constructive discussion with them.
Particularly tragic: While the public ORF is financed by all citizens – in the future probably by compulsory household levy – the party-political committees decide which options are reasonable for the fee-payers. Guided Democracy. Unworthy.