Nationalist Is Elected to a Swiss Cabinet Seat

A billionaire industrialist and fervent nationalist won a seat Wednesday in Switzerland’s federal Cabinet -- the nation’s most powerful elected body -- a move likely to lead to a clampdown on immigration and to deepen the Alpine nation’s isolation from the rest of Europe.

Though often regarded abroad as a right-wing extremist, Christoph Blocher, the firebrand leader of the Swiss People’s Party, is widely respected by business leaders at home.

His election by lawmakers drew praise from banks and industry but alarm from refugee aid groups, which were swift to note his inflammatory, anti-immigrant rhetoric and warn him against endangering Swiss humanitarian traditions.

After his election to the Cabinet by parliament, Blocher, 63, took pains to stress that he would work with his six colleagues in the Cabinet -- some of whom he once dismissed as incompetent -- to tackle economic problems.

“Hundreds of thousands of people have huge expectations of me entering the Cabinet,” he said. “I will do my best.”

He also vowed to be “unconventional.”

Switzerland’s big banks and its main industry organization hailed the Cabinet’s rightward shift. Blocher is a vocal defender of banking secrecy and seeks lower taxes and less state intervention in business.

Blocher, a preacher’s son, spent 24 years in parliament. He gained international notoriety in the 1990s through his vocal campaign against foreign pressure on Swiss banks to compensate the heirs of Holocaust victims. He was often accused of being an anti-Semite, which he denied.

A die-hard defender of strict Swiss neutrality, Blocher has campaigned against letting Swiss soldiers take part in foreign peacekeeping. He also spearheaded Swiss resistance to joining the European Union.