[HIGHLIGHTS] Austria: ÖVP and FPÖ lose in Innsbruck election – KPÖ in the local council

The Greens remained just about the strongest force in the Tyrolean capital. The conservative ÖVP experienced a “debacle” with its electoral alliance.

For the first time in decades, a list from the Communist Party of Austria (KPÖ+) entered the city parliament. The people of Innsbruck will elect their mayor in a runoff election on April 28th. The incumbent, Georg Willi (Greens) and ex-ÖVP man Johannes Anzengruber, who came first with almost 23 percent of the vote, will take part. Mayor Willi announced on ORF that he wanted to forge a ‘stable progressive coalition’ with the communists. The ÖVP only rallied behind former State Secretary Florian Tursky shortly before the vote. The lists gathered in the alliance fell from around 30 to around ten percent. The FPÖ lost more than three percent. Previously, more than half of the local council seats were held by the ÖVP and Freedom Party alliance.