Wilhelm Molterer

Infobox_Minister
name =Wilhelm Molterer

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imagesize =
order =Vice Chancellor of Austria
term_start =11 January, 2007
term_end =
predecessor =Hubert Gorbach
successor =
chancellor =Alfred Gusenbauer
office2 =Finance Minister of Austria
term_start2 =11 January, 2007
term_end2 =
predecessor2 =Karl-Heinz Grasser
chancellor2 =Alfred Gusenbauer
office3 =Agriculture Minister of Austria
term_start3 =29 November, 1994
term_end3 =28 February, 2003
predecessor3 =Franz Fischler
successor3 =Josef Pröll
chancellor3 =Franz Vranitzky
Viktor Klima
Wolfgang Schüssel
birth_date =birth date and age|1955|05|14
birth_place =Steyr, Upper Austria
profession =politician
party =ÖVP
religion =Roman Catholic|

Wilhelm Molterer (born 14 May, 1955 in Steyr) is an Austrian politician, currently Vice Chancellor of Austria and Minister of Finance and head of the conservative Austrian People's Party.

Youth and early years in politics

Molterer's birth name is Kletzmayr. He grew up in the Upper Austrian town of Sierning, and was raised by his aunt and her husband, Josef Molterer who adopted him at the age of 14 years. He attended the College of Agriculture in Sankt Florian, graduated in 1974, and studied social economy at the University of Linz.

While a student Molterer first engaged in politics; he became head of the "Österreichische Studentenunion" (ÖSU) local branch at his university, and a member of the local students' council. By 1978, when a long-simmering policy conflict within the Austrian ÖSU developed towards a split in the party, Molterer supported liberal positions which sometimes were quite grossly at odds with the more conservative mainstream opinion of the ÖSU's main sponsor, the Austrian People's Party. Several Austrian journalists, consulters, entrepreneurs, academicians and finance people who enjoy national and international reputation today (for instance, Peter Adler, Helmut Brandstätter, Gerald Bast, Hermann Mucke and Wolfgang Pilarz) were Molterer's immediate peers in the ÖSU national executive board at this time. In 1980, he obtained his master's degree.

Professional politician

From 1981 to 1984, Molterer was active in the Austrian Farmer's Association. Starting in 1987, he worked in the Austrian ministry of agriculture, under the ministers Josef Riegler and Franz Fischler. From 1994 to 2003, Molterer himself held this national government position.

In 2003, he became the chairman of the party's parliamentary club. Just like any other leading politician in Austria at any time, he found it hard to resist the opportunity to politically intervene in the workings of the state-owned national television agency, the ORF. In Molterer's case his critics coined the term "Moltofon" as a catchphase for the particularly frequent phone calls the agency reportedly received from his party office.

He was named acting party head on 9 January 2007. He was formally elected as party head at the federal party convention on April 21 2007. By terminating his party's perticipation in the Grand Coalition with the SPÖ he precipitated the early re-elections held on September 28 2008 which ended in the worst result for the ÖVP (and the SPÖ) since their respective inception after World War II [ [http://orf.at/wahl08/ Austrian election 2008] ] . Wilhelm Molterer stepped down as a party head on September 29 2008, and was replaced by Josef Pröll.

External links

* [http://aeiou.iicm.tugraz.at/aeiou.encyclop.m/m775159.htm;internal&action=_setlanguage.action?LANGUAGE=en Entry for Wilhelm Molterer in the AEIOU Encyclopedia]

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