As of: March 14, 2024, 2:25 p.m
By: Paula Völkner
Comments
Press
Split
While the election campaign is underway in Austria, election results are causing uproar in the municipality of Golling.
A special kind of faux pas occurs.
Golling - Election mishaps are not unknown in Germany - especially in Berlin.
But not every election goes smoothly in neighboring Austria either.
This is also the case with the local council election in Golling.
The Social Democratic Party of Austria (SPÖ) and the Freedom Party of Austria (FPÖ) are affected by the mix-up.
The fact that the abbreviations SPÖ and FPÖ only differ by one letter could have led to confusion when the election results were transmitted in Golling.
According to ORF
reports,
the votes were counted correctly, but the two parties were swapped when they were sent to the electoral authority.
The election mishap has negative consequences, particularly for the ÖVP
The faux pas in one of the polling stations has consequences for the parties - not just for the SPÖ and FPÖ.
Around ten percent of the votes in Golling incorrectly went to the FPÖ.
However, the mix-up had a particularly negative impact on the Austrian People's Party (ÖVP).
Serious mishap in the 2023 election: Andreas Babler from the SPÖ shows his raised fist as part of an extraordinary federal party conference of the SPÖ © Helmut Fohringer/APA/dpa
The
ORF
reported that the mayor of the town, Peter Harlander (ÖVP), had previously been voted out and his SPÖ competitor Martin Dietrich had taken over the office.
According to the preliminary results, the ÖVP had nine seats in the local council and the SPÖ only eight.
That would change now.
If the result is corrected, the SPÖ will have ten mandates.
The election mishap was embarrassing for everyone involved, the town's designated mayor told
ORF
.
Election mishaps in Austria: Wrong winner chosen and glue on voting card didn't stick
It was only in the summer of 2023 that there was a faux pas in an election for the SPÖ's top candidate.
At that time, an
ORF
journalist doubted the result of the election at the party conference.
The result of the follow-up check: a glitch in the counting, the wrong candidate was named the winner.
It was not Hans-Peter Doskozil, but his competitor Andreas Babler who got the most votes.
And not everything went smoothly in the run-up to the election of the Federal President in 2016.
The problem at that time was with the adhesive for the envelopes of the voting cards.
The glue didn't hold, so the election had to be postponed.
In Austria, a new National Council will be elected in autumn 2024.
(pav)