Luis Durnwalder

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Luis Durnwalder

Luis Durnwalder (born 23 September 1941) is an Italian politician (of Austrian ancestry) and the governor of the tri-lingual (Italian, German, Ladin) Province of Bolzano, located in Northern Italy.

Durnwalder was born in Falzes. After attending school in Falzes and Bressanone, he originally planned to enter into an Augustinian choir at the Neustift monastery in Bressanone; however, Durnwalder decided instead to study law and agriculture. During this time he began his political activity and became chairman of the student group Südtiroler Hochschülerschaft (until 1965).

In 1969 he became mayor of his home municipality and in 1973 delegate to the provincial state assembly; he was Regional Counsellor for the Land Register from 1973 to 1978. At that time he also worked as director of the farmers' association, Südtiroler Bauernbund, and moved to Bolzano, where he lives today. After the 1978 elections, he was promoted to member of the regional government. Since 1989 he has presided over the Bolzano provincial government.

Durnwalder is a member of the South Tyrolean People's Party. In the last two elections he was able to gather more than 100,000 primary votes from South Tyroleans from all language groups, meaning that more than a quarter of all voters voted for him. His popularity is attributed above all to his pragmatism.

Furthermore, each day starting from 6 a.m. he holds a consulting hour, to which one can appear without advance notification.