HQ of conservative OEVP occupied in Austria!!!
Earlier today the headquarter of the conservative OeVP here in Vienna was occupied by 40 activists in order to protest against the formation of a government of OeVP with the far right FPOe of Joerg Haider. Banners were attached to the front of the building which state "Stop Racism" and "Wolfgang Haider - Thanks, no!" (Wolfgang Schuessel is the leader of the OeVP and Joerg Haider the leader of the FPOe). At the moment (17:00 local time) the building is still occupied and should at least be occupied until the beginning of the later mentioned manifestation.
Tomorrow (02-Feb-2000) at 5 p.m. there will be a demonstration entitled "No Coalition with racism", that has been organized just since yesterday by some human rights organizations. Also some organizations from the radical left will take part, however it has to be stated that a "coalition without racism" in Austria is impossible, because racism is strongly established in Austrian society.
Just 2 recent examples of how racism "works" in daily life in Austria:
On May 1st Marcus Omofuma was killed by Austrian police officers during his deportation from Austria. A human rights complaint which was filed afterwards, now has been refused, because (that was the official statement) such a complaint has to be brought in by the concerned person (that would be Marcus himself).
5 years ago in Oberwart (a small city in Austria) 5 gypsies were killed through a bomb attack by the far right. Now the street that leads to the houses of the gypsies has been named after the high- ranking NSDAP-Doctor Wilhelm Smital. When confronted with this issue the mayor of Oberwart said that he knew Smital was a Nazi "but at that time everyone was a Nazi". Smital joined the NSDAP in 1933 when the NSDAP was still illegal in Austria.
To fight against the FPOe does not mean for us, that we support the other Austrian Parties. Haiders FPOe is that strong, because non of the parties ever did anything to work up the (extensive) participation and cooperation of Austrians in Nazi mass murders. All parties (from the VDU - later renamed to FPOe - to the Communist Party) just were interested to integrate the old Nazis in their parties. And the FPOe is also that strong, because the main parties in Austria pursue racist politics since years.
But we are also not that stupid not to see, how much harder the times for refugees, the poor and political enemies of the FPOe will get, if a far right party will be part of the Austrian government.
