The new party “Bündnis Deutschland” is to be founded this Sunday. The party with some former AfD members wants to compete with the CDU and FDP in particular.
A new party is about to be founded: this Sunday, the party “Bündnis Deutschland” wants to hold its founding meeting in Fulda. The new party settles in the middle-class conservative spectrum and could thus become a competitor to the CDU and FDP. But there should also be some connections to the AfD.
According to the FAZ, the approximately 50 members should primarily be made up of former Union supporters and members of the “free voters”. What is behind the new party?
Disappointed supporters of the Union and members of the “free voters” are said to have come together in conservative political associations – this is how the idea of the new party is said to have come about. The founders are said to have been preparing to found the party for around nine months: in addition to draft party statutes, they were also able to obtain material funding commitments from external supporters, reports the FAZ.
The presumed chairman of the “Alliance Germany” is said to be Stefan Große, who previously became known as the state chairman of the Free Voters in Saxony. The Leipziger Volkszeitung reports that by leaving the Free Voters, he is said to have escaped impeachment proceedings due to right-wing tendencies.
But there are also connections between the new party and the AfD: The “Moorhuhn” inventor Markus Scheer is said to be another party member. Scheer is said to have previously had a great deal of influence in the North Rhine-Westphalian AfD. Entire state executives only came about with his support, reports the WDR.
However, his past could be his undoing among the new voters: After all, Scheer was sentenced to more than three years in prison in 2009 for accounting fraud, fraud and breach of trust.
The party not only ascribes itself to classic conservative politics, but also wants to appeal to the broader spectrum of society, Scheer told WDR. The aim is to win voters from the middle class in particular. In addition, “Bündnis Deutschland” is for the EU and would not deny climate change.
According to WDR, the new party would also position itself clearly against extremism. But there should be a similarity to the AFD: The current policy would lead Germany into a bad future and “Bündnis Deutschland” wants to change that, according to Scheer.
Another former AfD member now wants to get involved in the new party: Corina Bülow would like to help build Alliance Germany in North Rhine-Westphalia. She herself was a member of the AfD and works for a member of the Bundestag. Her task at “Bündnis Deutschland” is primarily the selection of personnel: This is to ensure that new members do not change the content of the party, reports WDR.
Accordingly, new staff should first be checked through trial memberships. This is to ensure that no extremists hijack the party, according to Markus Scheer.
The new foundation is being followed with interest within the AfD in North Rhine-Westphalia. At the request of the WDR, the AfD country chief Martin Vincentz writes that the AfD looks at the new party with composure. He refers to previous party foundations that had emerged from the AfD and had failed. So far, the new party has not been able to win over prominent politicians either.
But Markus Scheer could become a problem for the AfD in NRW, after all, hardly anyone knows as much about the AfD in NRW as he does. The fact that Scheer also spreads information about the NRW-AfD via “Bündnis Deutschland” could become a real concern for the AfD.
In recent years, new parties have been founded again and again, but so far they have not been able to assert themselves. The radical party “Team Todenhöfer” of the former CDU politician Jürgen Todenhöfer could not enter the German Bundestag.
“Die Basis” also tried to achieve election success with the increasing dissatisfaction with corona measures – they also failed at the five percent hurdle.
Whether the new party is also doomed to fail or whether it can establish itself remains to be seen in the future. The test for the new party will be the Bremen state elections next May.
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