(CNN) -- Thousands of people turned out Saturday in the southern Austrian city of Klagenfurt for the funeral of politician Joerg Haider, a popular but polarizing figure who led right-wing Austrian politics for decades. Harald Scheucher, mayor of Klagenfurt, speaks in front of the coffin of Joerg Haider Saturday. Among those attending the service at the town's central Neuen Platz square were Austrian President Heinz Fischer and Chancellor Alfred Gusenbauer. Haider's widow sat in the front row with her two daughters, all of them dressed in black. "Many people expected things of Joerg Haider that they themselves weren't able to fulfill, and he too expected things of people that he wasn't able to fulfill," Gusenbauer said at the funeral. "Therefore his death, and the end of his life, may be a time to think about whether death's only consolation is that we can now reconcile things that seemed irreconcilable during his lifetime."
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Thousands attend the funeral of right-wing politician Joerg Haider in Austria
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Chancellor: Many people expected things of Haider they themselves could not fulfill
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Haider died last Saturday in a car accident, spokesman confirms he was drunk
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Haider drew support from many but criticized for his praise of some Nazi policies
But he drew widespread criticism both at home and abroad for his anti-immigrant stance and remarks considered anti-Semitic, and in 1991 he publicly praised @placeholder's employment policy.