Tyrol election: NEOS list with a focus on youth and women
In the run-up to the state elections on September 25, the Tyrolean NEOS are betting on youth, femininity and expertise. According to state spokesman and top candidate Dominik Oberhofer, the pink state and district lists reflect the “desire of the population for change and departure”. In addition, he saw the three core issues of the party – education, economy and clean politics – embodied in the APA conversation. A basic mandate in a district is “possible”.
Three of the four top candidates at state level and five of nine top district candidates are women – despite the lack of a quota – Oberhofer emphasized with pride. The pink state list has been fixed since the beginning of July.
The headmistress of Kufstein and this year’s mayoral candidate Birgit Obermüller was elected second in a three-stage primary election process. She was in the municipal council elections in February in the second largest city in Tyrol and had achieved 30.55 percent. They are followed by the 21-year-old student Susanna Riedlsperger, who, according to Oberhofer, could become the youngest member of the state parliament of all time in Tyrol, and the cultural manager Franziska Schumi, who is also running as a top candidate in Innsbruck. Austria’s first NEOS mayor to date, Markus Moser, is in fifth place. In the February elections, however, he was defeated by his challenger close to the ÖVP and had to resign from office.
In addition, the three youngest top candidates in this year’s state elections all ran for the Pinken, Oberhofer noted, namely in addition to the aforementioned list third Riedlsperger (21), who is also running as a top candidate in her home district of Kitzbühel, and 19-year-old Kevin Ladstätter (top candidate in Schwaz) and 18-year-old Ivana Monz (top candidate in Landeck). “According to the political competitors, you won’t find any boys or women these days who want to be in the front ranks of politics. Exactly the opposite is the case with us,” emphasized NEOS club chairman Oberhofer. His party competes in all nine districts.
A basic mandate is Oberhofer “possible and desirable” and if so, it can be obtained in the Innsbruck or Innsbruck-Land districts. Schumi should therefore reach more than 14.5 percent in Innsbruck, the teacher Stefan Wirtenberger, who is running for first place in the most populous district of Innsbruck-Land, more than 10.5 percent, Oberhofer called specific figures. He himself is only a candidate on the state list and lets the others “take precedence”.
In 2018, the club chairman led NEOS into the Tyrolean state parliament right away and guided them through their first municipal council and mayoral elections in February. In the last state election, NEOS had achieved 5.21 percent of the votes. Since then, the party has been represented – for the first time – by two mandataries in the state parliament. Club chairman deputy Andreas Leitgeb is no longer a candidate today.
If the state spokesman has his way, his pink parliamentary group should double this year. The frontman’s declared goal: “We want to become so strong that no one can get past us”. In any case, there is reason for optimism at the moment: Most recently, a survey had shown them 12.3 percent. Oberhofer has been flirting publicly with government participation for a year and a half – then as now he saw NEOS in a three-party coalition. With four mandates, you can “participate in a stable threesome,” he substantiates.
With the hoped-for four mandates, the areas of business, tourism, education, youth and digitization can also be “covered in the best possible way”. With Obermüller and Wirtenberger, “two real education experts have excellent chances of entering the Tyrolean state parliament,” the 42-year-old Oberhofer referred to a pink core issue. Schumi and the top candidate in the Lienz district, Jasmin Simoner, are “at home as online marketing managers and business analysts in the digitized world”. And in the Reutte district, Markus Moll is an entrepreneur who is “not only well connected in the district but also internationally”, says Oberhofer.