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AfD heads city council: Auschwitz Committee head speaks of “devastating sign”
| Reading time: 3 minutes
Headquarters of the town hall: Gera town hall
Source: dpa / Jörg Carstensen
The Gera city council elected an AfD politician as president and sparked outrage. Representatives of the left and the SPD point to the CDU and accuse it of collaborating with the AfD. But she rejects it.
reThe Gera city council has elected an AfD politician as president and has sparked a heated controversy. “This is a devastating signal for the people of Gera and for the external impact of Gera,” the vice chairman of the Auschwitz International Committee, Christoph Heubner, said on Friday. The choice must “seem like a mockery to the Auschwitz survivors.”
The chairman of the board of the mobile council against the right, Sandro Witt, accused the city council of having chosen an AfD man as chairman of its committee “unnecessarily”. Either they don’t see the dangers of the extreme right or even make a conscious decision. “Both are fatal.”
Leading Thuringian politicians also harshly criticized the staff. Especially from the ranks of Red-Red-Green, the CDU was accused of cooperating with the AfD. “Even a day later, you can’t believe it,” Environment Minister Anja Siegesmund (Greens) wrote on Twitter. The CDU of Thuringia had to explain how they could make “common cause with those who despised democracy.”
Economy Minister and SPD regional leader Wolfgang Tiefensee (SPD) complained that the CDU and the AfD had already worked together in the town hall. Three applications signed jointly by them speak clear language.
AfD politicians elected by secret ballot
In a secret ballot on Thursday night, AfD city councilor Reinhard Etzrodt was elected speaker of the local parliament of Thuringia’s third-largest city. The retired doctor received 23 votes out of 40; the AfD itself only has twelve locations. The head of the AfD faction, Harald Frank, said on Friday that there had been no prior agreements with the other city council groups on voting behavior.
The AfD itself only has twelve seats in the local parliament. In addition to the Left (eight seats), the CDU (six), the citizens of Gera (three), Für Gera (three), the Greens (three) and the SPD (three) have more than one seat in the city council.
The country leader of the CDU, Christian Hirte, had decidedly rejected the accusations against his party on Thursday night: “The CDU clearly agreed in the parliamentary group not to vote for the AfD candidate.” This is exactly what happened. This was confirmed the next day by General Secretary Christian Herrgott: “AfD candidates do not find support from the Thuringia CDU. This was decided by the CDU and CDU parliamentary group in Gera before yesterday’s vote, clearly communicated it and adhered to it. “
Meanwhile, it was recalled on Twitter that in early March Prime Minister Bodo Ramelow (left), as a member of the state parliament, had voted for the AfD candidate for the post of vice president, Michael Kaufmann. On this note Ramelow replied with the words: “Is the difference between a vice president and a president really so unclear to you?” In August, a case in Hildburghausen in southern Thuringia caused a sensation in which the SPD city council group had acted together with the local AfD group.
The election for the municipal council presidency was preceded by a month-long dispute over the legality of Gera’s main statute. According to the statutes, the strongest political group has the right to propose this position. Since the May 2019 local elections, it has been the AfD, which was the strongest force at the time at 28.8 percent. Shortly before the first meeting after the elections, the state administrative office complained about this passage, but in the words of Mayor Julian Vonarb (non-party), the paragraph is no longer illegal. Vonarb had chaired the meetings thus far due to the roughly 15-month hangover around the city council presidency.
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