Europe watches warily as Austrians vote for president

Van der Bellen could be the first Austria’s president who is not from the mainstream parties since the end of World War II.

Austrian pollsters, however, say the split will grow to 53.3 percent to 46.7 percent in favor of Van der Bellen when the approximately 500,000 absentee votes are also tallied.

“A weight has fallen from all of Europe’s shoulders”, said German Vice Chancellor Sigmar Gabriel, a Social Democrat. Van der Bellen is liberal, left-of-center and pro-EU. Since the first round in May, populists have gained ground in Europe and elsewhere: Britain made a decision to leave the European Union in June, and Donald Trump was elected president in November.

In a statement posted on Facebook, Hofer said he was “incredibly sad it didn’t work out”, according to CNN.

That’s because Austrians tend to be bigger European Union skeptics than many of their neighbors, according to a poll by Dalia Research.

Heinz-Christian Strache, the leader of FPO, in an interview of ORF criticized that many other parties in Austria get together to fight against his party during the election.

“A red, white and red signal of hope and of positive change is being beamed from Vienna through Europe”, Van der Bellen said in a victory speech, referring to the colours on Austria’s flag.

The outcome was despite a campaign dominated by anti-establishment sentiments and anger over issues of Muslim immigration, the financial burden of refugees and migrants who are collecting benefits from Austria’s welfare system, and Europe’s wave of terrorist attacks over the a year ago following the start of the migrant crisis.

Van der Bellen’s “victory is a heavy defeat of nationalism and anti-European, backward-looking populism”, said European Parliament President Martin Schulz in a tweet.

Yesterday’s election was a rerun from May, which Mr Van der Bellen won by less than 1 percentage point.

Alexander Van der Bellen, candidate of the Austrian Greens, briefs the media besides his wife Doris Schmidauer after leaving a polling station and casting their votes in Vienna, Austria, Sunday, Dec. 4, 2016.

The outcome deals a crushing blow to Hofer who already narrowly lost to Van der Bellen, 72, in a first runoff in May, an outcome that was contested by the FPOe and eventually annulled over ballot counting breaches. This time the contest was watched across Europe because it was seen as an indicator of how well euroskeptic candidates will do elsewhere in the European Union next year. His defeat on Sunday by a far larger margin, observers said, may suggest European voters’ unease with the comparisons of their politicians to Trump.

“It’s an excellent starting position for further elections in Austria, he added. The right-wing rabble-rousers have to be stopped!”

For his part, Mr Hofer blamed the former leader of the UK Independence Party, Nigel Farage, for claiming on the Fox News chanel last week that a Freedom Party win would automatically result in a referendum on Austria’s membership of the EU.