After Van der Bellen’s announcement of his re-election on Sunday, the People’s Party consulted internally and decided not to put up its own candidate. At the same time, it was also decided not to make any recommendations. “People are mature and can make their own decisions,” Nehammer explained the decision in a written statement on Monday.
The ÖVP chairman also points out that the cooperation with the incumbent Federal President has been “very positive” in recent years and writes: “We wish him all the best for his candidacy.”
The Tyrolean ÖVP governor Günther Platter was stronger behind Van der Bellen. “He has my support,” said Platter when asked by APA. Van der Bellen is “with his calm and unexcited manner the right person for the office of Federal President”. You can feel his “Tyrolean mentality”.
SPÖ and NEOS already announced on Sunday that they would support Van der Bellen in his re-candidate. NEOS General Secretary Douglas Hoyos confirmed in a broadcast on Monday that his party would support the incumbent Federal President and was looking forward to further good cooperation. The NEOS are also fully behind the words of Van der Bellen that courageous positions must be taken. And Werner Kogler, the federal spokesman for the Greens, from whose ranks Van der Bellen once came, called his re-candidate good news and praised him as an “anchor of stability for Austria”.
Support for Van der Bellen now came from the Burgenland SPÖ state party leader and governor Hans Peter Doskozil. At the beginning of the year, he had insisted on his own red candidate for the Hofburg – as a “sign of a self-confident social democracy”. On Monday, when asked by APA, his office said that Doskozil supported the candidacy of the incumbent Federal President because he had shown stability in the past crises.
The FPÖ sees things very differently, which Van der Bellen has criticized as a “candidate of the system” and will nominate its own candidate. The Tyrolean FPÖ state party chairman Markus Abwerzger announced that the FPÖ would probably discuss the blue candidacy more intensively in a federal party executive meeting at the beginning of June. The decision or presentation of the candidate will only take place in the summer, said Abwerzger to the APA.
The FPÖ still has some good options after Norbert Hofer’s cancellation. When asked about a possible candidacy for Susanne Fürst, a member of the National Council who has always been highly regarded, Tyrol’s top blue man said: “She would also be – like some others – a good candidate”. Fürst recently took part in the Gauder Fest in the Zillertal, Austria’s largest spring and traditional costume festival, at the invitation of the Tyrolean FPÖ. Incidentally, Abwerzger also assumed that former BZÖ mandatary Gerald Grosz would run as an “independent candidate”.
The anti-vaccination party MFG also wants to decide on a possible candidate for the election of the Federal President in the summer, announced Federal Managing Director Gerhard Pöttler in a broadcast. In any case, his party was “dissatisfied” with Van der Bellen’s administration because he had actually approved all Covid laws.