Things are going wild again in Austrian domestic politics – despite school holidays and Easter holidays. The focus is once again on the FPÖ: sensitive chats from the era of the former right-wing populist leader Heinz-Christian Strache were made public in the run-up to a parliamentary committee of inquiry.
The news shows how the FPÖ wanted to dismantle the ORF broadcaster, that there were contacts with Chinese communists, and why today's party leader Herbert Kickl, as Interior Minister, acted in a party-political manner when it came to personnel issues. There is also an espionage scandal simmering around a constitutional protection officer who is said to have maintained contacts with a long-time Kickl confidant - the trail leads to Russia.
Chancellor Karl Nehammer's ÖVP, which is well behind the FPÖ in surveys six months before the National Council election, could benefit in this situation. The Christian Democrats wanted to reverse the trend with a campaign for Easter, which could also have come from the Kickl group.
In it, Nehammer's integration minister presented a commission on Maundy Thursday that is supposed to define the "Austrian dominant culture." A day later, on Good Friday, the Chancellor's Party digitally disseminated what it means by "leading culture": pictures of the maypole being put up and brass bands were emblazoned with slogans such as "tradition instead of multiculturalism" and "tradition and customs." The folklore photos were garnished with the sentence: “This is for the leading culture.”
But neither the play on words (“Leit” – “people”) was well received, nor was the idea that the cultural nation of Austria was a crass monoculture. Outrage and incomprehension also erupted in more conservative areas. The head of the Austrian brass band association distanced himself from the combat term “leading culture” in the “Standard” and criticized the party-political appropriation.
The fact that the Christian-based ÖVP sowed discord with its "multicultural" slogan on the day of Jesus Christ's death triggered its own dynamic. Nehammer received direct feedback from the Twitter successor Michael Landau, President of Caritas Europa, wrote: “It’s a bit embarrassing today.”
A little later, the ÖVP deleted the topic “Tradition instead of multiculturalism” from its website. The campaign was a complete failure.
Aftermath of the death of Pilnacek
Things are likely to continue to be unpleasant for the conservatives after the holidays. The circumstances surrounding the death of top official Christian Pilnacek cast shadows on the party. There are doubts as to whether everything was done correctly when the ÖVP-affiliated lawyer was rescued dead from the Danube in October, and data carriers are said to have disappeared. An anti-corruption expert appointed by the Ministry of Justice has now filed a complaint about possible misconduct by police officers present who are subordinate to the Ministry of the Interior led by the ÖVP.
The cause could be particularly dangerous for Nehammer's party colleague and parliamentary speaker Wolfgang Sobotka. Shortly before his death, the judicial officer Pilnacek, who had dominated the case for many years, made explosive claims in a secretly recorded conversation: Sobotka had demanded that he illegally turn off investigations. The head of parliament denies the allegations.
One of Sobotka's employees had chauffeured the drunken Pilnacek to his girlfriend in the Wachau on the night of his death. It is still unclear what exactly happened before the body was found.
When repeatedly asked by SPIEGEL and "Standard", Sobotka did not want to say whether Pilnacek was still in contact with the President of Parliament in the hours before his death. It would be obvious: there was a special close relationship between the top official and the top politician, as Sobotka's office explained in 2021. Christian Pilnacek has been "a personal friend of the president for a long time."
Social media moment of the week:
The ÖVP's “leading culture” slogans also inspired the satirical report “Die Tagespresse” to write an article that received a lot of attention on social media. The fun medium posted a photo of Chancellor Nehammer drinking a glass of beer in one go and garnished it with the slogan: "Blunznfett instead of Mohammed" - the word "Blunznfett" is Viennese and means drunk.
Stories we recommend to you today:
Strache chat messages: How the FPÖ wanted to dismantle the ORF
Guidelines for German-speaking countries: How should children and young people who are trans be treated?
Communist becomes Salzburg's deputy mayor: The rise of the nice Mr. Dankl
Get through the week safely!
Warm greetings from Vienna
Yours, Oliver Das Gupta, author for SPIEGEL and STANDARD
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