From the point of view of the change of roles, Klaus Webhofer had invited to the “summer talks” in ORF this year. Almost all party leader ended up in completely new roles almost a year after the National Council election-except for FPÖ party leader Herbert Kickl, who was the end of the interview series on Monday. Although he was the first to go through the destination a year ago, he was the only one to sit in the old armchair in the National Council: As is well known, around 29 percent in the National Council election has not become a chancellery, but buried negotiations with the ÖVP and “a summer as then”, which Kickl has largely spent away from the public.
Kickl did not deny that he had “rare”, Webhofer’s entry -level question: that was “like a band” that takes a break after a “successful tour”, go back to the studio and record a new album. “And with this we are now going on tour again,” said the FPÖ boss, including media criticism right at the start: There are now many other channels as TV studios and daily newspapers, from which the others “constantly laugh out”, to the affection of the population: “People feel literally.”
Blue PR cannon fires again
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If the intimate enemy Kickls, the ÖVP, the FPÖ has recently fallen into a kind of summer deep sleep. But 3380 results in the search for “FPÖ” in the archive of the Austria press agency, mind you since the beginning of the year, prove the opposite. And they were also active over the summer, thousands of parliamentary inquiries were made to Corona and NGOs. And: On Monday alone, the FPÖ shipped twelve press releases. The PR cannon in blue is constantly firing from all pipes to initiate political autumn.
Surprisingly for a Kickl interview, that was largely factual on Monday, in fact you saw a conversation, no duel. The theme list went through webhofer quickly: inflation, business location, structural reforms, labor market and pensions were broken. Also rumor that he could switch to Carinthia: he wanted to do it like Jörg Haider, who wanted to become Chancellor. “I gave a promise. You shouldn’t dance around with a butt on several church days.”
Electricity price brake and more gas production
But with the band metaphor, Kickl may even deliver a suitable summary of the interview right from the start: when will he finally put on a new record? Also on Monday, his superficial strategy was largely to ride rhetorical rides against everyone else, the “system parties” and the “established media”, but only to bring concrete solutions here and there: electricity price brake, more gas funding in your own soil and interventions for rents, food and energy prices remained that specifically. Otherwise he answered a lot with a package criticism of the “loser spamper”.
In the pensions, he said that he wanted to increase all by 2.7 percent. He did not want to answer whether he wanted to put up with the civil servant wages again. “It’s not that easy.” Police officers, for example, should get an increase, top officials should not. He wants to keep a referendum on structural reforms, such as in healthcare.
Webhofers Elfmeter
The fact that he polarizes in this way – in the trust index he is always far behind in the last place – he countered, for example, with a lack of relevance of these “measurements”. In the negotiations with the ÖVP, he was also not, as webhofer insinuated, was too little willing to compromise: “You can also say that I am someone who stands for his positions, principles, convictions that has and cannot buy.” Govering with the ÖVP would have meant “betrayal” on his voters. “I’m not ready for that.”
Kickl’s counter -questions mostly went into emptiness, webhofer did not get involved. But twice he put on a small penalty. First of all, when the moderator asked about gas deliveries from Russia. Whether Kickl was to buy gas from Russia again. This replied with the reference to the French who bought gas from Russia. “I’m talking about pipeline gas,” said Webhofer. “Ah, where did we land here?” Kickl made fun of it. So liquefied gas is okay? Webhofer was silent. “I prefer the dependency on gas that is cheap.”
Asylum was not an issue
He treated Kickl to the second with the fact that asylum issues could not be addressed at all. In the end, Kickl was able to land an ORF-Bash: of all things around the anniversary of the arrival of thousands of asylum seekers in field in September 2015, the topic was saved. “I am not surprised,” said Kickl.
