Axel Kassegger

At the Annual General Meeting of the Political Academy of the Freedom Party of Austria (FBI) on 1 September 2021, Axel Kassegger, an FPÖ member of the National Council and honorary professor was unanimously elected as the new President. He succeeds Federal Party Chairman and Member of the National Council Herbert Kickl, who resigned from the presidency as announced. The members of the general meeting and the newly-elected president thanked Herbert Kickl for his many years of successful work at the head of the political academy. Herbert Kickl expressed his pleasure that Axel Kassegger had been unanimously elected as President of the Political Academy of the Freedom Party of Austria. “I know and value Axel Kassegger as a colleague in the parliamentary party in the National Council, where with his expertise and dedication he has long been a key pillar of our political work  – to say nothing of his personal qualities. He is the right man at the right time for the Political Academy of the Freedom Party. In a nutshell: He is the perfect choice”, declared Herbert Kickl.

Axel Kassegger will build upon the work of his predecessor Herbert Kickl and the goals have been laid down: “In addition to further developing our excellent training programmes for our members and interested members of the public, I will place a special focus on expanding international educational activities and widening the relevant networks as well as on deepening and consolidating ideological foundations via symposia, publications and academic partnerships”, the new president announced.

Axel Kassegger has worked at the interface of academia, business and politics for more than 20 years. He studied law (Dr. iur. 1997), business administration (Mag. rer. soc. oec. 1994) and sports science (Mag. phil. 1996) at the University of Graz. The entrepreneur has in the past served as a lecturer at universities of applied sciences and universities in Austria and abroad and continues to do so today. He began his political career in 1987 at the Ring Freiheitlicher Studenten and has long held different political functions within our community of shared beliefs. Since 2013 Axel Kassegger has been an FPÖ Member of the National Council, chaired the parliamentary Science Committee, served as the Science and Business spokesman of the FPÖ parliamentary party and is currently Foreign Policy spokesman and Energy spokesman. He has published on energy policy and most recently on Austrian economic and industrial location policy. Axel Kassegger is a member of the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly and the Council of Europe in Strasbourg.