Austria’s ‘whizz-kid’ Sebastian Kurz announces far-right coalition before becoming world’s youngest leader
His party and the anti-immigration Freedom Party announced their coalition
Austria’s conservatives and the far-right agreed a coalition deal on Friday, two months after elections that saw the Alpine country move to the right and capping a year of successes for Europe’s nationalists.
The accord between Sebastian Kurz’s People’s Party (OeVP) and the anti-immigration Freedom Party (FPOe) announced late on Friday will see Kurz, 31, become chancellor and also the world’s youngest leader.
“We are happy that we have reached this agreement. Tomorrow [Saturday] we will inform the president about our programme and our team,” Kurz, foreign minister in the outgoing government, told reporters in Vienna.
“Voters gave us a clear mandate to take into account their concerns, particularly when it comes their security,” FPOe chief Heinz-Christian Strache told the same news conference.
The OeVP came first in the October 15 vote with 31.5 per cent after Kurz, who is nicknamed “wunderwuzzi” or whizz-kid, rebranded the staid party as his own personal “movement”, promising to get tough on immigration and lower taxes.