AFPPoliticus Björn Höcke van de AfD
NOS Nieuws•gisteren, 20:44
Charlotte Waaijers
correspondent Central Europe
Charlotte Waaijers
correspondent Central Europe
If there were elections in Germany on Sunday, more than one in five Germans would vote for the AfD, according to recent polls. Those elections will not take place in Germany yet, but at the moment the ‘Alternative für Deutschland’ party is doing better than the chancellor’s. For the past few weeks, Germany has had an AfD district administrator and mayor for the first time. More successes for the party, which is seen as far right, are desired by some and feared by others.
These days, the AfD campaign is settling down in Pirna, an old Saxon town with cobblestones, pastel stucco facades and flowers in the windows. A high, carved door gives access to the town hall: “my masterpiece”, says Tim Lochner. He is a carpenter, entrepreneur and recently also the person who has to become the first ‘Oberbürgermeister’ for the AfD here.
The party has set up a small podium on the market square where several AfD politicians address the people. Next to the stage hangs a meter-sized banner against ‘gendern’: a German term to name both men and women in one word, sometimes separated by an asterisk (for example Student).
This practice has become a point of political controversy. Conservative and right-wing politicians have made it a symbol of what they see as a left-wing campaign to force people to do things they don’t want to do. “German spelling has no ‘*innen’,” read the AfD banner.
Furthermore, the national government in particular has to suffer from the stage: it cannot be trusted. Climate measures are being imposed, foreigners are allowed to come and work in the country, and there is less and less left for the common man, is the message. When the name of a politician from the Green party is mentioned, the boos are the loudest.
“The other parties just take things away from us,” says a man drinking a beer on a square terrace. “If you are dissatisfied and want to achieve something, you can only vote AfD.”
Discontent, crises and unpopular government policy
Part of the AfD’s popularity can be explained by this kind of structural dissatisfaction, says political scientist Wolfgang Schroeder. “15 to 20 percent of the people are always dissatisfied. They are against the system, they want nothing to do with the established order. You can win them over as a party with a good offer.”
The various crises of the past year have now been added to this: war in Ukraine, threatening energy shortages, climate measures and rising prices. The way the national government deals with this and communicates about it is bad. “Not very happy government policy,” Schroeder calls it. “It does not respond enough to people’s needs.”
That feeds the need for a complete political change. And that is what the AfD has been promising since its foundation: an alternative to the established order.
Migration
Although many Germans no longer choose out of protest, but consciously for the AfD. Migration remains the main topic for AfD supporters. “That is the theme that determines the appeal of right-wing populist and far-right parties,” said Schroeder. “The idea that the borders should be closed, society should consist more of the same people who know our rules and traditions. Then we wouldn’t have the problems we have now.”
And it seems less and less controversial to say that out loud, as also appears in Pirna. “I’m not worried. Only those foreigners,” say two women on the square. The number of migrants in the region has increased over the past year, according to the most recent figures. Especially by refugees from Ukraine, a group that the people in the square in Pirna say they have less trouble with than with people “from Islamic countries”.
Compared to the average in Germany, the number of people with a migration background is many times smaller here. Yet a man on the square speaks of ‘repopulation’, he thinks that the German population is being exchanged for migrants. They don’t think it’s racist at all. “This has to be said.”
Right-wing extremist
The AfD party, meanwhile, is moving further and further towards the extreme corner. The internal security service keeps an eye on the party, and already calls some departments right-wing extremist. At a local level, where people often know the politicians from their everyday lives, this does not seem to be a major problem for voters.
According to candidate and carpenter Lochner, it is all nonsense, nothing more than a political campaign by the security service against the AfD. “Those who know me know that I am not a right-wing extremist.” In November it will be clear whether he is the first Oberbürgermeister for the AfD here.
2023-07-14 18:44:06
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