Demonstrators carried homemade signs, including "Stop den rassismus, stop den faschismus" (Stop racism, stop fascism), with many showing portraits of Freedom Party leader Jörg Haider and Adolf Hitler. The rally was held February 19 at the Heldenplatz in front of Vienna's Hofburg Palace, where Hitler addressed his supporters after German imperialism invaded Austria in 1938. Anti-Haider protests in 1993 drew 300,000 people.  
 

Daily protests

Antigovernment rallies are taking place almost daily in Vienna. Thousands of students from 40 different schools turned out February 18 and were threatened with reprimands from the school authorities. "Fight against racism and social austerity measures," was one of the banners.

The Social Democratic Party, the Green Party, many unions, human rights organizations, religious leaders, prominent artists, and pensioners' groups backed the February 19 action. People also came from Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, and the Netherlands.

Demonstrations in France the same day drew around 20,000 people in a number of cities. In Paris, 9,000 people marched both condemning rightist organizations in that country and raising anti-Haider slogans.

People's Party chancellor Wolfgang Schüssel dismissed the protests. "I expect that once again, there will be another emotional outpouring at the weekend with big demonstrations, where the old left- ists....young people and the Internet generation can get out and let off steam. Then things will at some point return to normal," he said.

Haider responded to the actions, saying, "Left socialist circles are misusing" the youth by paying them to participate in what he termed an "idiotic" demonstration, calling it a form of "street-violence."

Showing what is in store for working people under the new government, Lorenz Fritz, secretary-general of the employers' organization, the Federation of Austrian industry, said he looked forward to changes. "Under the old system of Social Partnership we earned the money and they [the unions] allocated it," Fritz said, adding that the "old system is breaking down and a new one is being put in place. It is high risk and it can fail. But it has to be done."

Hoping the response from working people will be minimal, Fritz said that the bosses in Austria "have measured strikes in seconds until now. This is abnormal. We will measure them in minutes in the future."  
 
 
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