Tyrolean daily newspaper “Leitartikel” from November 4th, 2023 by Marco Witting “Everything on one card”

2023-11-03 21:00:37

Innsbruck (OTS) – The poker for the mayor’s chair in Innsbruck has long been open. The somewhat united bourgeois camp around Florian Tursky will hype the duel with incumbent Georg Willi and declare a choice of direction.

All in – in the political poker game surrounding the Innsbruck municipal council elections in 2024, this seems to be the motto of all parties. But it’s all or nothing, especially for the now somewhat united bourgeois camp around the ÖVP, For Innsbruck and the Senior Citizens’ Association. State Secretary for Digitalization Florian Tursky is also putting everything on one political card with his candidacy. And you can already guess the trump card that “the New Innsbruck” will play. Tursky will present himself as a candidate who has nothing to do with the complete chaos of the period that is coming to an end and as the only one who can defeat incumbent Georg Willi in a runoff election. All in – to bring Innsbruck back for the ÖVP and to immediately give Tursky the best cards at the state level, as the jack of hearts, so to speak.
But it’s not that far yet, because now the toughest and most exciting election battle the state capital has ever seen is about to begin. Tursky’s start was rocky. The weeks of discussions surrounding VP Vice Hannes Anzengruber, who is known to be running with his own list after internal quarrels, had two effects. The State Secretary for Digitalization is now known, which was not the case before the internal party dispute, but Tursky can shake off the narrative of a united middle class. Yesterday’s city party conference couldn’t change that.
The new list will cost Anzengruber votes. How many? Nobody can seriously say that six months before the election. It will take a strong campaign for Tursky to even make it to the runoff. He will never tire of emphasizing that only he can bring about change in the city and beat incumbent Willi in a runoff election. It is somewhat surprising that the People’s Party, obviously the political home of all its proponents, does not appear at all – apart from the imprint on the homepage of “The New Innsbruck”. It remains to be seen whether this was the only compromise to bring Für Innsbruck on board.
New name, new candidate, new list. Thematically, there’s probably nothing entirely new. This is how you want to present yourself. The election campaign, which somehow seems to have already started, will not be one anyway, the status is now being decided on an issue. It will probably come down to a directional decision. And the more a conflict between the camps on the left and right of center escalates, the better the cards would be for Tursky.