Blue And Yellow Makes Brown
The People's Party has come to a working agreement with the far-right Freedom Party in Lower Austria that allows Johanna Mikl-Leitner to remain governor
Servus!
The unbelievable has come to pass. At the start of February, following regional elections in the state of Lower Austria in which the People’s Party (ÖVP) lost their absolute majority, I wrote to you explaining that “local Freedom Party (FPÖ) leader Udo Landbauer is so extreme” that the ÖVP would never go into coalition with the far-right; it “would be a political disaster.” I failed to take into account, however, that in Austria, things can always be worse, and at the end of last week, Lower Austrian governor Johanna Mikl-Leitner was up on stage with Landbauer, presenting their pact to the assembled press.
Mikl-Leitner started, perhaps, as she means to go on in this next and perhaps final phase of her political life. “I don’t know, based on your accents, if you’re all Lower Austrians here,” she said, which is hardly the best way to ingratiate yourself with a room full of journalists. One could argue, though, that her tone and manner were in-keeping with the …
