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There are several books on Chancellor Sebastian Kurz (ÖVP). Knittelfelder now tries the opposite and approaches the self-declared “pack animal” through his employees. In “Inside Türkis” he draws portraits of the “shadow men” (and fewer women) around the ÖVP boss.
Knittelfelder designs the image of a clique that has been established for years, which strangers can only join in exceptional cases and where personal loyalty to the boss counts more than loyalty to the party. “Party instead of party” is the title of the first part about the eight most important players in the “short circle”.
The second part is dedicated to seven political allies, from Finance Minister Gernot Blümel to Lower Austria Governor Johanna Mikl-Leitner. The first section undoubtedly offers more material. The appearance of the “Kurz system” is recounted here, in eight portraits and as of that April 2011 night in which Kurz sponsor Michael Spindelegger promoted the head of the JVP, who was still a party politician (“Geilomobil “), to the Secretary of State for Integration.
The central figures in the turquoise circle of power were already on board at the time: chief strategist Stefan Steiner, Philipp Maderthaner, head of marketing and campaigning and everything organizational, today’s ÖVP general secretary Axel Melchior. Press chief Gerald Fleischmann also docked at the time, initially not entirely on a voluntary basis and after gentle pressure from the party leader.
This creates the image of a well-coordinated and personally loyal team, politically socialized in the black heart of Lower Austria, with a correspondingly pronounced sense of power, calculated will of resistance and an avowed main opponent: the SPÖ. “Contrary to all prejudice, this is not an ideology-free Buberl game, but a partly mineral conservative group with hardline politicians,” the book says.
In addition, readers also learn a lot about handling the ÖVP crown crisis; for example, the decision to communicate restrictions somewhat sharper than the legal situation, given the green resistance to real curfews. Basically, however, the book provides a somewhat dim explanation for the chancellor’s success to date, that is, his keen sense of personnel decisions compared to predecessors like Werner Faymann and Christian Kern. Or, as Kurz himself says in the book, “I always want to have people around me who can do whatever I admire them for.”
