In view of the AfD’s high flight, Saxony’s Prime Minister Michael Kretschmer has warned of increasing polarization in Germany. “Something is slipping in this country,” said the CDU politician to the newspapers of the Funke media group. As an explanation for the AfD high, he said that people were confused about how politics was done in Germany. “We are on the way to polarization, as we know it from America. Last week’s debate did not show that everyone understood that.”
Even in the elections in Sonneberg, Thuringia, where an AfD politician was elected district administrator for the first time, German issues played a particularly important role. “Energy transition, heating law, refugee policy and the Russia embargo have brought victory to the AfD. These issues threaten to tear society apart,” says Kretschmer. Politicians resorted to “blame and dissociation instead of dealing with uncomfortable truths”. That is not responsible. “Now it has to be a matter of fact.”
When asked about the statements made by CDU leader Friedrich Merz, who had declared the Greens to be the main opponent in the federal government, Kretschmer said: “The federal government and the opposition can certainly work together in times of crisis. But this requires the willingness of the traffic light government.” The relationship between the federal and state governments has never been as bad as it is now. “The federal government has to choose a different political approach. In Germany we have to talk to each other more.” The situation is serious, warned Kretschmer. “We have to recognize that there is more than one opinion.”
