Austria's far-right finds new leader

Haider turned down the offer of leadership

By Bethany Bell Vienna

Austria's far-right Freedom Party, which has been thrown into turmoil over recent days following a string of resignations, has nominated a new candidate for leader of the party ahead of general elections in November.

The new candidate is the outgoing Minister for Transport, Mathias Reichhold.

The controversial former leader, Joerg Haider, had been offered the position, but he withdrew unexpectedly on Saturday.

Reichhold will have to heal a deeply divided party

An election will be held to fill the post at an extraordinary congress of the Freedom Party next Saturday, and so far Mr Reichhold is the only candidate.

It has been, in the words of one senior Freedom Party official, a disastrous few days for the far-right party.

A bitter power struggle between Mr Haider and the then leader of the party, Vice-Chancellor Susanne Riess-Passer, triggered the collapse of the Austrian Government just over a week ago.

The stage then looked clear for Mr Haider to once again take over power in the party he built up from a small minority group into one of Europe's most successful far-right movements.

But he threw the party into disarray at the weekend when he declared he was not standing after all.

He later said he had made the decision because he had received a threat to his family's safety.

Grassroot anger

But the outgoing general secretary of the Freedom Party, Peter Sichrovsky, said anger from rank-and-file members who blame Mr Haider for the collapse of the coalition could also have played a part in his decision not to stand.

It is now up to Mr Reichhold to try and heal the divisions in the deeply split party in time for the forthcoming general elections.

But quite how the party will fare in the campaign without the charismatic Mr Haider at the helm remains to be seen.

As one observer put it, the party now has to decide whether it wants to turn itself into a mainstream conservative group or to remain a far-right populous movement, skilled at winning votes, but not fit to govern.