Far-right set to make strong gains in Austria's EU vote

(VIENNA) - The far-right in Austria looks poised to match the strong gains it made in last year's general election when the nation goes to the polls on Sunday to elect its 17 members of the European Parliament.

Indeed, the FPOe -- with xenophobic slogans such as "The Occident in the hands of Christians" -- has effectively hijacked the EU election for its own populist agenda, leaving the mainstream parties completely on the defensive.

With only a few days to go before the vote, the FPOe and its photogenic leader Heinz Christian Strache, 39, looks set to win as much 14-17 percent of the vote, polls show, three times more than in 2004.

At the same time, the Social Democrat SPOe and the conservative OeVP parties, currently coalition partners, are expected to receive a drubbing, after running bland and anodyne campaigns.

"The two big parties have no vision of what Europe should be, so it's only logical that Strache dictate the agenda while the other two try to catch up, panting like little lap dogs," said Sonja Puntscher-Riekmann, deputy rector of Salzburg University.

"It's effectively a victory for populism," the political scientist said.

The FPOe's repertoire of slogans is odiously simplistic: from the "Occident in the hands of Christians" -- for which the party faces a charge of inciting religious hatred -- to its call for "Real Representatives instead of EU Cheats" and its proclamation that polling day on June 7 is "Payback Time".

The opposition party, which emerged as the third biggest party in the general election last September, is the only one to play the personality card with its leader, the perenially sun-tanned Strache with steel blue eyes, who did not shy away from brandishing a crucifix at a rally.

Banking again on the youth vote -- it was the 16-year-old first-time voters who gave his party such a push in last year's general election -- the FPOe portrays Strache as a Superman figure who defends western values in a special comic strip and video published on its website.

By contrast, the campaigns of the ruling parties are dull and unimaginative.

The Social Democrats' slogan sees the SPOe's candidate Hannes Swoboda as heading the "A-Team for Austria's interests in Europe", while the conservative OeVP states blandly: "Europe votes, Austria decides".

The other far-right party, the BZOe of the late politician Joerg Haider, which is expected to win a 4.0-6.0 percent share of the vote, has based its campaign on the perceived rise in crime following the abolition of border controls.

Caught on the defensive yet again, the ruling administration responded with a pledge to extend military patrols along Austria's borders, while only in December they had proclaimed the extension of the so-called Schengen agreement as a milestone in the greater European project.

Another card that the far-right likes to play is Turkey's ambition to join the EU, which the FPOe and BZOe denounce as the "Islamisation" of Europe.

In a recent televised debate, all the other parties -- with the exception of the environmentalist Greens -- jumped on the same bandwagon.

The daily Der Standard, in an editorial on Wednesday, complained that "empty slogans are covering up the small-mindedness of Austria's EU vote.

"But it's provincial Austrian parties who are putting forward candidates and not any European parties," it said.