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Greens struggle against far-right tide in eastern Germany

Thuringia is one of three eastern German states holding elections in September. But as the far-right AfD is riding high, the Green party is fighting for survival, polling on less than five percent.

Published: 23 August 2024 08:21 CEST

Madeleine Henfling, top candidate in Thuringia of the German party Buendnis 90 / Die Gruenen (The Greens) for the upcoming Thuringian state elections, visits the Kyffhaeuser Monument, also known as Barbarossa Monument or Kaiser Wilhelm Monument, near Bad Frankenhausen, on August 5th. Photo by JENS SCHLUETER / AFP

On top of a mountain in the lush green forest of Thuringia, the Kyffhaeuser monument was erected as a tribute to Kaiser Wilhelm I, the first head of a united Germany.

But the huge sandstone monument has become a symbol of division in the former East German state as it prepares to hold a key regional election on September 1st.

The nostalgic structure has become a popular meeting point for members of the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD), which is leading opinion polls ahead of the election on around 30 percent.

According to legend, Holy Roman Emperor Barbarossa has been sleeping at the monument for 800 years and his reawakening will restore the greatness of the German empire.

“The far right must not be allowed to appropriate this place,” Madeleine Henfling, the Green party’s top candidate for the election, told AFP at the foot of the monument.

“The monument is glorified by these guys. It’s very dangerous,” agreed Michael Fischer, 66, visiting the site with his daughter and grandchildren.

In a bid to stop the monument from being co-opted by the AfD, the local government is setting up a new European history documentation centre there.

Henfling, who has been campaigning against the neo-Nazi movement for more than 15 years, believes the centre will help stop the monument being used to fuel far-right political narratives.

Attacks and insults

Thuringia is one of three former East German states holding elections in September, with the AfD looking set to make big gains in all three.

Björn Höcke, a former history teacher who is now the head of the AfD in Thuringia, is one of the party’s most controversial figures and was fined twice this year for using a banned Nazi slogan.

Meanwhile, the Greens – part of the incumbent three-way coalition government in Thuringia – are fighting for their survival, polling on less than five percent.

Henfling, 41, was born in Ilmenau, a small village in the region, six years before the fall of the Berlin Wall and remembers being aware of the rising far right even as a child.

“It’s sort of in my DNA. I can smell Nazis 100 metres away, even in a headwind,” she told AFP.

Attacks on politicians from all parties have increased in the run-up to the election.

“We get insulted all the time, and for me this is nothing new,” said Henfling, who has been a member of Thuringia’s regional parliament for 10 years.

However, the danger “has diversified”, she said, with people of different ages and backgrounds now potentially posing a threat.

“Our members no longer give out flyers or stick up posters on their own, and especially not at night,” she said.

Henfling and her team use an anonymous black vehicle for campaign trips and notify the police each time they are out.

‘Tired of change’

When campaigning door to door, “there are certainly places we don’t go, because we know we’d be turned away and there’d be no point,” she said.

Henfling believes the Greens have struggled in the former East Germany because they are “asking people to change their behaviour (to protect the climate)”.

“Many people in Thuringia, and elsewhere, are tired of change – even if it’s for their own good,” she said.

After German reunification in 1990 and the collapse of the communist government, the former East Germany struggled with social deprivation and unemployment was rife.

“(People) are now afraid of being marginalised yet again, against a backdrop of uncertainty with the war in Ukraine and inflation,” Henfling said.

Henfling’s mother never found another job after being made redundant from a bookshop in 1990. But she believes trials like these have made East Germans stronger.

In the town of Nordhausen, a stone’s throw from the Kyffhaeuser monument, a 67-year-old pensioner who gave his name only as Wolfgang said he will be voting for the AfD.

“It’s because of the Greens that the economy is going to the dogs,” he said.

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Thousands of jobs have already been lost in the region, where wind farms now rise near abandoned open-pit mines and many people look with dread towards 2038, the deadline for the “coal exit”.

Their fears help explain the strong local support for the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD), which does not just rail against migrants but also rejects the green energy push and questions man-made climate change.

At local elections held in Spremberg in June, the AfD scored 39.3 percent – an omen ahead of regional elections next Sunday in the state of Brandenburg, which polls suggest it could win.

Lignite, or brown coal, may be a climate killer, but since the 19th century it has been key to the identity of the Lusatia industrial region on the Polish border, known as the Lausitz in German.

“Thousands of people here have been linked to coal their whole working lives,” said the town’s mayor, Christine Herntier, an independent who has held the post for a decade.

“We are proud of our tradition,” said Herntier, 67, pointing to a huge map on her office wall of the Schwarze Pumpe plant and its surrounding industrial complex.

Most people in Spremberg, population 25,000, have grudgingly accepted the coal phase-out plan, under which the government has earmarked billions for structural transition plans, she said.

But, she added, ahead of the state election the winding down of coal “is still a big issue”.

‘Anger over wind farm’

Michael Hanko, the AfD’s top representative in Spremberg, said he is certain that the looming demise of the lignite industry is “one of the main reasons” residents are voting for his party.

“I don’t think the government has really got them on board with this whole prescribed transformation, saying that we now have to do everything with renewable energies,” Hanko said.

Michael Hanko, the AfD (Alternative for Germany) top candidate, in Spremberg, eastern Germany on, September 9, 2024. Photo by Femke COLBORNE / AFP

The AfD, founded about a decade ago, scored a triumph earlier this month when it won an election in the eastern state of Thuringia and came a close second in Saxony.

It now also has a good chance of winning in Brandenburg, the state that surrounds Berlin, where it is polling narrowly in first place at around 27 percent.

When the German government decided five years ago to phase out coal, it pledged around €40 billion to help coal regions adapt, with €17 billion for the Lausitz alone.

Much of the money is intended to flow into developing the renewables and hydrogen sectors, helping the region maintain its identity as an energy hub.

But residents complain the investment has been too slow to materialise and is flowing into the wrong places.

In Spremberg, plans to extend a nearby wind park have caused outrage among some locals, who fear it will be a threat to 150-year-old trees, a protected swallow species and drinking water.

‘Something different’

Coal has long been synonymous with the Lausitz region, which takes in parts of Brandenburg and Saxony and a small strip of Poland, and where lignite was discovered in the late 18th century.

But the industry all but collapsed after German reunification in 1990, when most of the region’s open pit mines were shut down and thousands of jobs vanished.

Today, only around 8,000 people are employed in the lignite industry across the Lausitz, with 4,500 of them in Brandenburg, though the industry is still one of the largest private employers in the state and coal remains a strong part of the region’s identity.

Already weary from the problems caused by reunification, people in the region have felt “overwhelmed” by recent global challenges, said Lars Katzmarek, a board member of the Pro-Lausitz campaign group.

Lars Katzmarek, board member of the Pro-Lausitz campaign group. Photo by Femke COLBORNE / AFP

“The coronavirus, the energy crisis, the Ukraine war – these are all very difficult things that people still haven’t fully digested… and perhaps at some point they just close their ears,” he said.

On a rainy morning in Spremberg, Joachim Paschke, 81, who used to work in mechanical engineering and welding, was buying bread rolls in the bakery opposite the town hall.

“I’m definitely not an AfD supporter but I can understand people who are,” he said.

“The established parties have nothing concrete and the AfD is offering something different. People want change.”

By Femke COLBORNE