Far right has second chance in Austrian presidential election

Austria will provide a new gauge of the populist wave sweeping Western democracies on Sunday, as the divided country holds a vote that could deliver the first freely-elected far-right head of state in Europe since World War Two.

The knife-edge presidential run-off is all the more dramatic for being a re-run of an election held six months ago - before Britain chose to leave the European Union and Americans elected Donald Trump as president - offering an indication of whether popular anger at the political establishment has grown.

When Norbert Hofer of the anti-immigration Freedom Party (FPO) narrowly lost the original run-off in May with 49.65% of the vote, European governments breathed a sigh of relief. Far-right parties like France's National Front, however, cheered the record performance.

Opinion polls suggest the race remains too close to call and could again come down to postal ballots, meaning the final result might come as late as Tuesday. Some 6.4 million Austrians are eligible to vote at polling stations which opened at 0600 GMT and will close at 1600 GMT. Exit polls are expected shortly afterwards.

Demonstrators protest against the far-right presidential candidate Norbert Hofer in Vienna, Austria on December 3, 2016. AFP

What influence Trump and Brexit have had on Austria is unclear, but the fault lines are similar - blue-collar workers have largely backed Hofer, the highly educated favour his opponent, former Greens leader Alexander Van der Bellen.

Van der Bellen, 72, has put Brexit at the heart of his campaign, arguing that Hofer wants Austria to hold its own "Oexit" referendum, putting jobs at risk in the small, trade-dependent country.

"Let us not play with this fire. Let us not play with Oexit," Van der Bellen said in their last televised debate, referring to the fact Hofer initially said Austria could hold its own referendum within a year before backing down.

A Hofer win would raise the prospect of two near-simultaneous blows to Europe's political establishment. Italy is holding a referendum on Sunday on constitutional reform that polls suggest Prime Minister Matteo Renzi will lose.

Austria's president traditionally has a largely ceremonial role, but Hofer has made clear he wants to be an interventionist head of state, threatening to dismiss a government if it raises taxes and calling for referendums on a range of issues, even though referendums are beyond the job's remit.

"You will be amazed at what will be possible," Hofer, 45, said in April when asked about the president's powers.

The president also plays an important part in forming coalitions. Van der Bellen has said he would try to prevent an FPO-led government even if it won an election. The FPO is running first in polls with support of roughly a third of voters, with parliamentary elections due in 2018.

Austrian far-right Freedom Party (FPOe) presidential candidate Norbert Hofer arrives at a polling station to cast his ballot in Pinkafeld, Austria, December 4, 2016. AFP

Banana republic

Austria has for decades been dominated by two centrist parties that are once again in coalition, and anger at that entrenched duopoly has fuelled support for the far-right FPO, which says it wants to end the two parties' grip on power.

The country, which stretches from Slovakia to Switzerland and borders Germany, was swept up in Europe's migration crisis last year, stoking unease among many voters already concerned about globalisation and rising unemployment, playing into the FPO's hands.

Whatever the outcome, weary Austrian voters hope it will at least bring to an end an election that has dragged on for almost a year after a comedy of errors that prompted some Austrian media to call the country a "banana republic".

The result of the May 22 run-off was overturned because of irregularities in the count of postal ballots, mostly due to election officials cutting corners as they raced to complete the count. The re-run was then postponed because the glue on the envelopes for some postal ballots did not stick.

Officials are this time aiming to do everything by the book, in the hope that a small delay to the result prevents bigger problems down the line.

Is the far-right also rising in #Austria? Populist politics in Sunday's presidential election: https://t.co/kHcfBLKejN cc #FPÕ #bpw16 #FN pic.twitter.com/65ZRrA3S9j

— KCTS 9 (@KCTS9) December 4, 2016

Reason, not extremes

Hofer, described as the far-right's "friendly face", appears neck-and-neck with ex-Greens party chief Van der Bellen. The 72-year-old, who runs as an independent, won by just 31,000 votes in May. "Day of reckoning" is how tabloid Oesterreich described the race on its front page Sunday. The re-run ends an ugly 11-month campaign, which saw Hofer posters being defaced with Hitler moustaches and Van der Bellen's with dog excrement. "The new president has to unify the country, this long election has polarised society and that's not just the case in Austria," voter Katharina Gayer told in Vienna. Both candidates issued final video appeals on Saturday amid fears of growing voter fatigue. Hofer vowed to keep Austria "safe", while Van der Bellen urged people to choose "reason, not extremes". Hofer has largely avoided inflammatory rhetoric, instead tapping into public anxieties about record immigration and rising unemployment. His polished style saw him triumph in a first round in April, sensationally knocking out candidates from the two main centrist parties that have dominated Austrian politics since 1945. Disillusioned voters are "flocking to populist movements and the easy answers they offer," political analyst Thomas Hofer (no relation) told. "We want to be part of the EU but not to lose our identity," voter Helwig Leibinger told at Hofer's final rally in Vienna on Friday. "We want a commander-in-chief of the armed forces who can give the right orders."

Austrian election could propel European Union's first far-right president to power https://t.co/Tksv958xgo— AFP news agency (@AFP) December 4, 2016

Unused powers

What a Hofer victory might mean remains unclear. He wants more Swiss-style direct democracy, including a referendum on Austria's EU membership if Turkey joins or if the bloc becomes more centralised.

Hitherto unused presidential powers could, in theory, allow Hofer to fire the coalition government.

More realistically his victory might prompt the two main parties to pull the plug on their unhappy union and call fresh elections, benefiting the poll-leading FPOe.

In 2000, over 150,000 people had marched in Vienna against the FPOe -- then led by the late, SS-admiring Joerg Haider -- after it entered a coalition with the conservative People's Party.

But observers say the far-right's rise to power may not trigger the same backlash now that populists are gaining ground across the continent.

Brussels #EUrocrats will get very little sleep tonight ahead of #Italy and #Austria votes. YOU REAP WHAT YOU SOW!https://t.co/X2tDkTK345

— Lucky Sam (@abermans) December 3, 2016