VIENNA—Austrian voters handed a first-ever general election victory to the Eurosceptic right-wing Freedom Party on Sunday, preliminary results showed.
The Head of Freedom Party (FPO) held a slim lead in opinion polls for months over Chancellor Karl Nehammer’s ruling liberal-conservative right-wing Austrian People’s Party (OVP) in a campaign dominated by immigration and worries about the economy.
Led by the 55-year-old Herbert Kickl, the FPO won 28.8 percent of the vote, ahead of the OVP on 26.3 percent, and the left-wing Social Democrats (SPO) on 21.1 percent, according to a projection based on nearly all the vote by pollster Foresight for broadcaster ORF, a slightly bigger victory margin than final polls had indicated.
“We’ve made Austrian history because it’s the first time the Freedom Party is Number 1 in a parliamentary election, and you have to think how far we’ve come,” Kickl said after the party’s record showing, which came seven decades after its foundation in the 1950s.
If Kickl cannot persuade another party to ally with him, it could end the FPO’s hopes of forming a government.
Only the OVP has offered any indication it could work with the FPO, but it has ruled out doing so with Kickl, who has given no hint he could step aside to let someone else take charge.
Seat projections suggested the OVP and SPO, which ruled Austria for decades together, could just muster a majority without a third party, which had long looked unlikely.
On Sunday, Kickl said he was ready to talk with all parties over forming a coalition, and President Alexander Van der Bellen, who oversees the formation of governments, urged parties to find common ground in negotiations in the coming weeks.