Austria’s far-right Freedom party candidate Norbert Hofer was defeated in the presidential poll by a former leader of the Green party, Alexander Van der Bellen. Sunday’s elections were a re-run of May’s polls, where Van der Bellen, who ran as an independent, won marginally. However, the May results were annulled by the constitutional court, citing voting irregularities, reported The Guardian.
Soon after the first exit polls were announced on Sunday, Hofer took to his Facebook page to congratulate Bellen and conceded defeat. He thanked his supporters and said he was “incredibly sad” that it did not work out. “I congratulate Alexander Van der Bellen for his success and ask all Austrians to pull together and work together,” he said.
During his victory speech, Van der Bellen, 72, said, “A red, white and red signal of hope and of positive change is being beamed from Vienna through Europe. I will be a pro-European president of Austria open to the world,” Reuters reported. He added that these election results were not a repeat, but a new election “after the world around us has changed”, referring to the Brexit vote and Donald Trump’s win in November and the general shift in international politics towards the far-right, reported The Guardian.
A projection by pollster SORA for broadcaster ORF showed Van der Bellen on 53.3% and Hofer on 46.7 percent with a margin of error of 0.4% points, according to Reuters. The postal ballots were left to count.
After Austria took in a large number of refugees who fled war from Syria, Hofer had said that Islam had “no place” in their country, reported The Strait Times.
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