Secondly, I thought some poeople might be interested
on the following statement from the Austrian Young
European Movement (JEF-Austria) on the Haider issue
and the EU response. It is (unsurprisingly) rather
more informed than the current debate in the British
media.
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JEF-Austria's official position concerning the current
situatiuon in Austria
Dear friends and Jeffers,
In this situation it is not easy to find the right
words but we would like to first of all point out the
following: There can be no doubt about JEF-Austria's
opposition against Joerg Haider and his policies. At
the same time we were all shocked about the reaction
of Austria's partners in the Union and we had to
realise, that the desicion of Lissabon had brought
Austria into a fatal deadlock, which worsened the
political situation in Austria even more than it has
already been before.
First of all let us take a look at the mentioned
situation in Austria: Our country was gouverned since
World War II (with some few exceptions) by the
two previousely big parties SPOe (Social Democratic
Party of Austria) and OeVP (Austrian Peoples Party).
In 1986 Jörg Haider took over the FPOe (Austrian
Freedom Party) - in those days only the marginal third
power in the Austrian political environment. Up to
this moment the FPOe consisted of two major
ideological wings: Liberals (here you find the reason
for the party's name) and Nationalists. The ongoing
struggle between those two directions was brought to
an end from the moment Haider took over the party.
This issue was finally resolved by the break-off of
the liberal wing (foundation of the Party "Liberal
Forum") and the resignment of the FPOe from its
membership in the international organisation of the
liberal parties.
While the Liberal Forum is loosing slowly its
importance again, Haider and his FPOe run one success
after the other. He knows exactly what certain people
want to hear.
On the other hand the governing parties SPOe and OeVP
were in the unfortunate situation to be chained
together because of the lack of other parliamentarian
majorities since 1986. Since that time Austria seemed
to have lost the chance of change of power, which is
the most necessary thing for a democracy, as there
were just three real options: Two of them included the
FPOe and the one therefore remaining option was and is
the "big coalition" of SPOe and OeVP. In fact the
cooperation of these two parties seems to have come to
a dead-end. The "red-black" coalition is - at least
with the present political actors - burned out.
At the same time Austria desperately waits for the
realisation of urgant reforms (recovery of the budget,
reform of the social system, media policy, security
policy, research and development, etc.). It's already
four months that we are waiting for a new government
that tackles these reforms.
Obviously the OeVP now dares to make the step which
every party refused to do since 1986. The OeVP wants
to govern together with the FPOe and consequently to
break out of the vicious circle as it is: Big
Coalition > Burnout through govermental work > Haider
can fully establish his opposition policy > Haider
gains profits in votes. At the last election Haider
reached the second position in Austria (with about 400
votes in front of the OeVP).
After that Austria now faces the real danger that the
maintainance ot the status quo in Austria would
establish the FPOe as the strongest political party at
the next elections.
During the last ten days the delegations of OeVP and
FPOe are talking about the programme of their probable
coalition without - by the way - the official order by
the president of the republic.
The whole country - Haider`s opponents as well as his
supporters - are curious what would be the outcome of
that option. Anyway it seemed to be obvious that this
is the only way to create a stable government in
Austria and - even more important - the only
possibility to stop Haider´s rise, as far as this is
possible anyhow. The basis of these hope is found in
the following thoughts: 1) An FPOe in power is no
longer able to get profile in opposition and will be
forced to take unpopular measures.: 2) SPOe and OVPe
get the opportunity to present themselves with a new
profile and to modernise themselves. The OVPe in the
role of the leading governing party can prove its
potential as creative power and the SPOE as big
opposition can now overtake again the role for its
traditional voters - an ability they have lost to the
FPOe recently. In other words: Against the
perspective of any election under the maintainance of
the present goverenment there is the well-founded hope
that at elections after the expirement of "black-blue"
a new distribution of power in parliament can happen
(e.g. red-green) and that the FPOe will not continue
in furtheron gaining votes.
This analysis is totally in question after the
reaction of the 14 EU-member countries.
Whatever was published about the debates between black
and blue showed that Wolfgang Schüssel would have
reached a success. He was able to reach the
agreement of FPOe about a more tolerant policy
concerning imigration (of course nobody can expect
such a government would fulfill a really
immigration-friendly policy especially as EU agrees to
deal with immigration in a restrictive way, but at
least the demanded stop of immigration by the FPOe was
no longer on the table); the OeVP achieved the
agreement of FPOe
towards enlargement of the Union, too, and has
determined to move into that coalition only when
Austria continues with its pro-european policy.
In that situation the EU-member states turn up and
execute an action without any example in internation
relations. The decision of the 14 hits all European
Austrians directly in their heart. As JEF we
understand and share the intention of the EU-partners
- especially their warning of the danger concerning
rassist and intolerant policies. That new measurement
in European Politics has to be welcomed and must lead
to the fact that all member states look at their own
policies and act more liberal and open towards
immigrants.
The internal consequences of the Lisboa resolution can
on the other hand not be estimated - it moved Austria
into a dilemma with dangerous consequences as MEP
Ursula Stenzel (OeVP) correctly mentioned: Either
Austria establishes that government and will be really
isolated or it gives in to the pressure from outside
which might lead to a further uncalculable
strenghtening of the FPOe.
In any case, the pro-european work that we have done
so far in Austria is completely destroyed and Haider
will be happy about it.
We want to close with an appeal to all Jeffers: Do not
let it happen, that Austria as a whole will be banned.
We ask everyone not to put any unqualified statements
like they already happened in german JEF-Info into
the debate. Please respect that Austria finds itself
since years in a very difficult political situation
even without the pressure from abroad. And -
please! - we are not a country of faschists!
The only thing left to say is that the Europeans in
Austria desperately wait for HELP from their friends
in Europe.
Yours,
JEF-Austria
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