Far right AfD cracks Germany's post-Nazi firewalls with success in the
east
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[May 31, 2024]
By Sarah Marsh and Andreas Rinke
SONNEBERG, Germany (Reuters) - In a recent discussion by the east German
district council of Sonneberg about getting refugees into work, Roland
Schliewe of the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) said demanding
jobs could not be given to North Africans because they had a low IQ.
Despite the remarks, recorded in a transcript obtained by Reuters,
Schliewe was re-elected to Sonneberg's council on Sunday. The AfD won
26% of the vote across the state of Thuringia, up eight points from
2019.
In neighboring Hildburghausen, a man who sells merchandise featuring
Nazi and Ku Klux Klan motifs won 25% and is now in a run-off to become
district administrator.
Such events were for decades unthinkable in a Germany so traumatized by
the Nazi era that it installed checks and balances to prevent right-wing
extremists ever taking power again.
But with a national election next year, and the AfD polling second at
around 16%, it must face the fact that right-wing extremism is now
widely accepted in the poorer eastern regions such as Thuringia and
changing the shape of politics in west Germany too.
Interviews with a dozen local politicians as well as political analysts
and a top intelligence official show how the discourse of extremism in
Thuringia is being normalized and fomenting anger towards certain groups
of society like refugees and climate activists.
The AfD portrays itself as the target of a complacent, self-serving
establishment that it stands ready to sweep away.

In its heartland, formerly communist eastern Germany, incomes are lower,
mainstream parties are less rooted, and democracy is only three decades
old.
The party is suspected of "extremism" by the BfV domestic intelligence
agency at national level and certified as such in Thuringia.
Its national surge over the past year, helped by a cost-of-living
crisis, has been dented only slightly by a string of scandals.
It made gains on Sunday in district and city councils in Thuringia and
reached June 9 run-offs for governing posts in nine districts.
"They are incrementally conquering the lower levels, conquering spaces,"
said political scientist Oliver Lembcke at the University of Bochum.
"And this is possible because in some regions now, people feel freer to
support the AfD openly."
As well as rejecting immigration, the AfD is an aggressive opponent of
"green" measures to cut fossil fuel emissions, an issue that has spurred
farmer protests across Germany and Europe.
NAZI-TYPE LANGUAGE NO LONGER TABOO
Stephan Kramer, head of Thuringia's domestic intelligence agency, said
it was normalizing the discourse of extremism, defined as attacking the
democratic basis of Germany's constitution.
"This leads to further disinhibition and radicalization in parts of the
population," he told Reuters. "Everyday interactions are becoming
increasingly aggressive."
Marcel Rocho, 44, owner of a bar in the town of Sonneberg, said an AfD
city councilor had once toasted a friend with the Nazi greeting "Sieg
Heil!" ("Hail Victory!"). The councilor, who was also re-elected on
Sunday, denies the allegations.
"Ten years ago, you might have heard these kinds of greetings in
someone's garage - but not in public, like now."
The AfD has not made it into state or federal government as other
parties refuse to form a coalition with it.
But it leads surveys ahead of three eastern regional assembly elections
in September, including Thuringia. It may not be able to govern
afterwards - but already in Thuringia, opposition parties have passed
laws with AfD support.
Nationwide, the AfD also has little chance of attaining power next year.
But its role in eroding the vote of traditional parties is set to
promote more strained and ultimately unpopular alliances of unlikely
bedfellows, such as Chancellor Olaf Scholz's current Social
Democrat-Liberal-Green coalition, just as, in Kramer's words, "hatred
and agitation dominate the political climate of discussion".
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General view of a street in Sonneberg, Germany, May 21, 2024.
Shortly after the far-right Alternative for Germany party (AFD) won
its first governing post in the eastern district of Sonneberg last
June, state funding for civic education projects including the ones
about the Holocaust faced the chop. REUTERS/Karina Hessland-Wissel

"The enemies of democracy are using their democratic rights in the
parliaments to delegitimize and destabilize the state by
deliberately destroying trust in democracy and its institutions," he
said.
Germans often nervously evoke the rise of the Nazis in the weak
inter-war Weimar Republic, after the humiliating defeat of the
German Reich in World War One and the Great Depression.
Kramer said today's Germany had a much more robust democratic
tradition, but there were parallels in the current discontent and
erosion of faith in democracy.
RACIST INSULTS AND VIOLENCE ON THE RISE
German authorities are supposed to vet candidates for extremism. Yet
critics say they are failing, perhaps because they are complacent,
lack resources, fear retaliation - or, more worryingly, because they
are themselves increasingly right-wing.
Robert Sesselmann passed his "democracy check" last year after being
elected district administrator in Sonneberg with 53%, even though
Thuringia's BfV delivered a 10-page dossier on him. It was the first
time the AfD had won a governing post.
Once in office, he tried to cut funds for civic education projects
including trips for teenagers to the Nazi concentration camp at
Buchenwald, four councilors told Reuters. Sesselmann said the
district's optional services in particular are being scrutinized due
to budget consolidation.
In a speech at an AfD event last October, recorded and posted on
Facebook, he said refugees habitually turned to drug dealing or
other illegal business when given cash, and so should only get
material support instead.
He said it hurt him to spend funds on health because it was not
going to "our people" but to refugees who had no health insurance.
Such rhetoric has made life hard for Sonneberg's refugees.
Ukrainian refugee Iryna Holovko, 39, said her daughter had been
bullied at school, and added: "I was walking down the street when
someone just stuck their middle finger up at me and told me to go
back to my country ...
"Then, when I was at the hospital, people were asking why Ukrainians
were always sick and needing treatment."
Last year, Sonneberg recorded 20 incidents of right-wing violence,
including on refugee shelters, against four in 2022, according to
the rights group Ezra.

And Heidi Buettner, former councilor for the Greens in Sonneberg,
said a note was pushed through her letterbox calling her a "Dirty
Green swine".
Many people are being put off political activity, Thuringia Greens
chief Max Reschke said.
Mainstream parties are struggling to engage younger people, and
fielded fewer candidates in Thuringia's local elections this year
than in 2019.
Meanwhile the AfD, only 11 years old, has been expanding, and
fielded 44% more candidates.
"We are seeing a clearing-out of established political culture,"
said political scientist Lembcke. "Meanwhile, the AfD doesn't face
as much stigma anymore and is filling the void."
($1 = 0.9233 euros)
(Reporting by Sarah Marsh; Editing by Kevin Liffey)
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