Political party in Austria announces wrong leader due to Excel file technical error
Jun 07, 2023
Innsbruck [Austria], June 7: The Social Democratic Party - a political party in Austria has mistakenly announced its leader due to a technical error involving an Excel file.
Officials of the Socialist-Democratic Party (SPO), the centre-left party in Austria , announced on June 5 that Andreas Babler was the winner of the party leadership race, not Hans Peter Doskozil as announced. before that, according to The Guardian.
Mr. Babler is the mayor of Traiskirchen, while Mr. Doskozil is the governor of Burgenland. Mr. Doskozil was announced as the winner on June 3, but SPO officials say a mistake led to the misrepresentation.
"The ballots did not match the published digital results. Due to a technical error in the Excel file, the results were mixed," said Michaela Grubesa, the SPO's election affairs official.
The mistake was discovered after a journalist noticed a missing vote in the final result and reported it to the election commission. A recount was then conducted.
This rare incident happened a year before Austria entered parliamentary elections. The People's Conservative Party (OVP) and Greens are in control of parliament.
The election of the SPO party was conducted to replace the outgoing leader Pamela Rendi-Wagner. Mr. Babler (50 years old) describes himself as a Marxist and has European skepticism. He vowed to bring the SPO back to its leftist roots.
He said the confusion in the vote counting process was "painful" for those involved and he wanted to get the SPO back in full force.
Meanwhile, Mr. Doskozil, 52, takes a more right-wing stance on issues like immigration and has promised to win back support from voters who have turned to the far-right Freedom Party (FPO).
The latest polls show that the FPO is leading while the SPO is second or third in the election next year.
Source: ThanhNien Newspaper
