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EU whistle-blower complicates Austria vote outlook
 EU whistle-blower complicates Austria vote outlook
Tuesday, August 1, 2006
VIENNA - Reuters
A
European Union lawmaker who exposed inflated perks enjoyed by
colleagues is set to enter Austria's Oct. 1 election, in a move likely
to complicate the formation of a new government. Pollsters
said Hans-Peter Martin's candidacy could snare up to 8 percent of the
vote, eroding smaller rightist and leftist protest parties that up to
now have been needed as partners for stable governing coalitions in
Vienna. His "Citizens List for
Democracy, Controls and Justice" will make it harder for Joerg Haider's
rightist Alliance for the Future of Austria (BZOe), now part of the
government, and for hard-right Freedom Party to re-enter parliament. Martin
will need to gather 2,600 signatures by Aug. 25 to enter the campaign
but that appeared just a small hurdle given fervent support from
Austria's most widely read newspaper, the splashy Krone tabloid. "I
am concerned with citizens' rights rather than the domination of
political parties. This will be a citizens' list, not a party," Martin,
49, a former journalist, told Reuters. Krone,
in which Martin has been a regular columnist for years, praised him as
"the scourge of the establishment" and recommended that the significant
proportion of Austrians seen as likely to stay home on Election Day
vote for him instead. Martin
entered the European Parliament in 1999 as a Social Democrat but left
to sit as an independent. He was re-elected in 2004 with a 14 percent
of the vote by appealing to those who see entrenched mainstream
politicians as unaccountable and corrupt. That
year, Martin, who had been campaigning to rein in EU parliamentary
privileges, caused a stir by surreptitiously filming colleagues leaving
Brussels or Strasbourg after signing in for daily stipends. Martin's candidacy further scrambles an already murky outlook for the Austrian election. Chancellor Wolfgang Schuessel's People's Party is favoured to come in in front. But
his coalition with Haider looks less likely to survive after Martin's
entry and Schuessel could be forced into a shaky grand coalition with
the main opposition Social Democrats.
Published on "turkish daily news online", 01.08.2006.
Read the article on "turkish daily news" website
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