Talks are on

Anti-Kickl mood and Babler doubts ahead of meeting

Currently at the center of attention: Herbert Kickl (FPÖ) and Andreas Babler (SPÖ)

(Bild: APA/HANS KLAUS TECHT)

A timetable for party talks has now been drawn up: on Tuesday afternoon, the SPÖ and ÖVP as well as the ÖVP and FPÖ will talk to each other. This will be followed on Thursday by talks between the Freedom Party and the Social Democrats - who are once again preoccupied with themselves ...

Following Federal President Alexander Van der Bellen's order to the FPÖ, ÖVP and SPÖ, possibilities for cooperation will be explored. However, it seems unrealistic that an agreement will be reached. The rifts are now too deep.

The SPÖ and ÖVP each announced the dates on Friday evening in a short statement. The talks will be conducted in accordance with the mandate and wishes of the Federal President and the results will be communicated to him afterwards, they said.

Nobody wants to work with Kickl
Because a "stalemate" between the FPÖ, ÖVP and SPÖ prevented the usual process of forming a coalition after the National Council elections, Van der Bellen had not commissioned any party to form a government for the time being. Instead, the three parties with the most votes are to "reliably clarify what kind of cooperation would be conceivable" by the end of next week.

On Thursday, Federal Chancellor Karl Nehammer (ÖVP), who does not want to form a coalition with the FPÖ under party leader Herbert Kickl, generally reaffirmed that he would keep the promises he made before the election. Not only Nehammer does not want to form a coalition with Kickl, the SPÖ had also completely ruled out working together with the Freedom Party.

However, the Social Democrats could govern with the ÖVP. However, due to the wafer-thin majority that these two parliamentary groups would have in the National Council, the participation of a third party would be advantageous. This would involve the NEOS or the Greens, who will not take part in future - at least official - talks for the time being.

Unrest within the SPÖ
Meanwhile, SPÖ chairman Andreas Babler has already been confronted with advice from within his own party. Styrian state party leader Anton Lang, who is about to be elected in his own state, called for the party to go into opposition. "If you put the party programs of the ÖVP and SPÖ on top of each other, there are huge differences. Normally, the smaller partner is less successful than the larger one," he said in the Kleine Zeitung newspaper.

Lang also criticized his federal party leader in terms of content. His approach to wealth and inheritance tax was "completely wrong". Although the right issues had been chosen, they had not been communicated well.

"And if you abandon all of that now with government participation, then you haven't hit a brick wall. It would be better for the SPÖ to remain in opposition. Otherwise we will have no credibility until the day we die." The candidacy for the party chairmanship by PR consultant Rudi Fußi, who attests that the party is in a "pitiful" state, is also causing additional unrest. He accuses Babler of having "overreached himself".