The regional youth pastor of the Evangelical Church in Central Germany, Peter Herrfurth, believes in the effect of civil commitment, even after the AfD's election victory. âI am quite sure: civil society will not stand idle, but will intervene and protect people,â he told the Evangelical Press Service. Many people have already gotten involved. âIt was clear beforehand that it doesnât end on September 6th with the election of the state parliament.â
At the democracy festival of the alliance âSaxony-Anhalt. Open to the world!â On the Saturday before the election, Herrfurth, as a co-organizer, experienced in his own words how âempoweringâ it can be to celebrate democracy with more than 15,000 people. âWe are the colorful face from Saxony-Anhalt that was sent into the world,â he said. Regarding the party itself, he said: âThe AfD should have been banned long ago.â By being in the state parliament, she is strengthening herself. The AfD is normalizing the public communication of hatred. AfD voters would sometimes reject other people because of their gender identity or origin. "It usually doesn't help to argue, but rather to get to know each other. Then you realize: We are different, but we are human," said the Magdeburg pastor.
The news says that many AfD voters voted for the party for reasons of content, said the theologian: "But I say that many people are not even aware of the specific content of the election program and its consequences. Many are disappointed or angry at the decisions of the federal government." For example, voters hoped that the AfD would lower energy and gasoline prices. That has nothing to do with the election in Saxony-Anhalt, said Herrfurth.
In view of the election results in Saxony-Anhalt, the chairman of the supervisory board of the DAX giant Siemens Energy is warning of a change of course in the federal government's reform policy. âThe biggest mistake our country could make now would be to withdraw reforms that have been recognized as correct because there is fear of doing poorly again in the next election,â Joe Kaeser told the Westdeutsche Allgemeine Zeitung (WAZ). "To question necessary reforms just because you have been punished in Saxony-Anhalt would be very problematic. Such a zigzag course would do even more damage to the credibility of the federal government," he continued.
According to the report, Kaeser is also clearly positioning itself against the AfD. âJust take the plan from the AfD election program to leave todayâs EU and return to the D-Mark: That would be a catastrophe for Germany as an export country,â he told the newspaper. "If we were to reintroduce the D-Mark, investors and investors would buy it on a large scale. Due to the high demand from abroad, the D-Mark would be worth more than other currencies. However, with a revalued D-Mark, our products for the international market would immediately become more expensive." According to Kaser, this plan alone disqualifies the AfD from leading the world's third-largest economy, writes WAZ in advance.
The coalition should examine how many people still have an employment history with a very early career start and what costs maintaining the regulation would incur for them. Today there are hardly any young people who start working life at the age of 14 or 15 and reach 45 years of contributions well before the regular retirement age. âIt will grow out of this in the next few years because no one starts that early anymore,â said Schnieder.
Friedrich Merz spent the evening of the state elections in Saxony-Anhalt almost without the CDU Prime Minister. As âBildâ reports, the party headquarters had invited the presidium to the Konrad-Adenauer-Haus on Sunday from 4 p.m. to follow the results together - but only Schleswig-Holstein's head of government Daniel GĂŒnther appeared, as did Berlin's CDU top candidate Stefan Evers. The newspaper quotes party circles as saying that the Chancellor was âvery touchedâ by this.
After the BSW entered the state parliament of Saxony-Anhalt, Sahra Wagenknecht is optimistic for the House of Representatives election in Berlin. "We saw that it was enough. We entered the state parliament in Saxony-Anhalt and we can do the same in Berlin," she said. She spoke of a âsignal effect.â The BSW is currently at 4 percent in surveys.
According to the representative survey (for the Neubrandenburg âNordkurierâ), the SPD would get 33 percent of the votes if there were a state election next Sunday. That is four percentage points more than in the Insa survey for the newspaper published four weeks ago. The AfD would remain unchanged at 36 percent. The CDU loses three percentage points compared to the previous survey and would only get 7 percent.
BSW founder Sahra Wagenknecht rules out a coalition between her party and the AfD in Saxony-Anhalt. âIt would also be a mistake to try to form a government with the AfD now,â said Wagenknecht on WELT TV. However, the BSW wants to use joint majorities for individual projects. Wagenknecht also justified her rejection with her party's experiences in Thuringia and Brandenburg. The BSW entered into government alliances in 2024 immediately after entering the state parliaments for the first time and paid âa lot of moneyâ for this, especially in Thuringia. A new party initially does not have enough state political experience and can easily be âripped offâ by its partners. Despite sharp attacks from the AfD, Wagenknecht spoke out in favor of talks. âEvery Democrat has to talk to all the forces that are in Parliament,â she said. This is the only way to determine which political projects could be implemented together.
AfD politician Leif-Erik Holm contradicts the Chancellor's accusation that the AfD's remigration concept is nothing other than âethnic cleansing based on origin and skin colorâ. Something like that doesn't come from the AfD, says Holm. The party wants to curb illegal immigration and enforce deportations according to law. But the AfD also wants the immigration of skilled workers. Holm brushed aside the objection that AfD politicians were talking about âmillions of repatriationsâ.
