Women in politics
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The woman in the high seat can not be disturbed. She has her hands folded under her chin, as in the photo of a school yearbook. Far below, a few vultures are pecking grimly on the ground. The Chemnitz painter Jan Kummer painted the painting. Since November 2018 it hangs in the anteroom of the mayor of the city and in a certain way, says Barbara Ludwig, it should probably represent her. The first woman in this office.
Milena Hassenkamp / SPIEGEL ONLINE
Painting by Jan Kummer
Since August 26, 2018, much has happened to this First Mayor, who has been in office for twelve years. Since that date, their city has been known for one thing above all else: the death of Daniel Hillig, who was allegedly killed by two refugees at a city festival, and the subsequent demonstrations in which right-wing extremists and neo-Nazi hooligans marched in the front. An accusation was filed against one of the alleged perpetrators. "They all now see the Karl Marx head, Germany flags and a Hitler salute," says Ludwig about the image of their city. Since August of last year, she has been fighting for this picture to disappear again.
GERMANY
Leverkusen Eva Lux (SPD), 63, mayor
Munich Dorothea Wiepcke (CSU), 37, city councilor
"The events," as Ludwig calls what happened in Chemnitz in August and September, have made the city visible to many in Germany and the world in the first place. Eight months later, there are also international press inquiries. Yesterday, the "New York Times" was there and wanted to know how the mayor is doing now. Ludwig says in the interviews again and again the same thing: that she wants to show that Chemnitz "next to this ugly face" also has a different face.
Ludwig was yelled down
The ugly face has not completely disappeared yet. A few days ago, the right-wing Alliance Pro Chemnitz, which is being monitored by the Office for the Protection of the Constitution, inaugurated its civil office. And two months ago in the football stadium fans of Chemnitzer FC remembered the neo-Nazi Thomas Haller. Between the construction sites on which a new Chemnitz arises, there are still empty houses. In some windows, German flags replace the curtains. Much has been written about Chemnitz, and some of it is true.
Ludwig was shouted down and asked to resign. She was praised because she does not hide that Chemnitz has a far-right scene. She was booed because some Chemnitzer felt that she was in the right corner.
She held talks with the citizens and the press. Successively came Saxony's Prime Minister Michael Kretschmer, Federal President Frank-Walter Steinmeier and Family Minister Franziska Giffey. Because Angela Merkel arrived too late, according to Ludwig, she criticized the Chancellor.
Ludwig has gone to its limits at this time and sometimes beyond, she says. Seven days after the events, she burst into tears in the town hall. Until then she had never publicly shown weakness. "Otherwise I would not have been right here." She has just recovered from a sudden hearing loss. For three weeks she was on sick leave.
After the turn into the SPD
Now Ludwig is back and wants to look ahead. Therefore, she insists on Chemnitz 'application for European Capital of Culture. "Breaks and new beginnings" is the topic with which Chemnitz wants to win. Ludwig speaks of artists such as the city's own band Kraftklub, whose first record is hanging in their office. From the architecture of Karl Marx City and how it is now modernized. Your city needs this title, like no other. "We always wanted to be seen," says Ludwig. Just not as it has since 26 August 2018.
On a Friday in May, the small petite woman with the short haircut between tall men in suits and laughs. Actually, the Lord Mayor wanted to shoot an image video today: "Why Chemnitz is interesting as a conference center". But the sky is gray. So Ludwig visits the local utility company, lays the foundation for the new office building, taps the mortar, shakes hands, and congratulates.
Uwe Meinhold / SPIEGEL ONLINE
Barbara Ludwig stands at the laying of the foundation stone for a new commercial building between the managing directors of the companies involved in the construction.
While the men on the podium talk about concrete, Ludwig is firmly on both legs, straight. When the fourth man delivers his speech, she drums softly with her fingers on the table.
If something takes too long, Ludwig seems impatient. She hates being unpunctual. That's the teacher in her. The woman who developed her own school model and went into politics to implement it. Even today it is addressed by former students. Also between the men in suits: "It's great," says a young woman, "that my class teacher is now mayor."
more on the subject
This step was not easy. "That's nothing for you." With this sentence a party colleague wanted to end the political career of Barbara Ludwig, before she had started. The teacher had joined after the turn in 1991 in the SPD and considered to run for the state parliament. She was not really right. But when she realized that the colleague did not want her at the post, she decided, "Now you're doing it" - and was chosen.
Then she made a career: first in the state parliament, then as a culture department in Chemnitz, as Saxon State Minister of Science and the Arts, as a member of the Federal Executive of the SPD. Ludwig has been Lord Mayor since September 2006.
Dear women - as mother's day
It has asserted itself in a male domain that was poorly permeable in the 1990s, much less for a single mother. She has come into office for which there is no quota. Hardly she did not like all that, she says. Perhaps because she grew up in the GDR with the self-conception that the family "just comes along" with their professional goals. Ludwig was already a mother, her daughter was just a part of life.
Because she sees it that way, the request that she made this morning seemed so odd: a Chemnitz department store wants her to stand behind the cash register on Mother's Day. "Mom is the best," is the name of the action. When she passes by the department store later, Ludwig notes that Mother's Day did not exist in the GDR. Instead, there was the Women's Day, because one did not want to be reduced to the role of the mother: "I thought that we brought this self-confidence with us in the reunion." Sometimes she does not seem to be sure.
Because of course it is still not for society to see a woman at the top. "Women and power," says Ludwig as she walks through her city, "that's one thing."
She was convinced that women in leadership positions still do not get sympathy and acceptance. "I know that and then I forget it again." Only when something goes wrong, that always falls on her, the woman, back. She is perceived as a woman "more, more seen, more observed". That can be positive. But that can also mean insults, as she has experienced in recent months.
Uwe Meinhold / SPIEGEL ONLINE
Barbara Ludwig (SPD)
She was "tired of the office," local media wrote. They criticized that Ludwig did not interrupt their vacation for the events in the football stadium. That she commented on the ongoing process in the case of Hillig: "An acquittal would be difficult for Chemnitz." Or that she had the town party canceled by a representative this year. At the sausage stand in the city center, Chemnitzer will be talking about this Friday: they do not like it.
While Ludwig walks through the city, the Chemnitzer nod again and again. It slows down near the Alanya doner kebab. At the place where Daniel Hillig died eight months ago, there is now a gray memorial stone in the concrete. Ludwig had him installed together with the family of the deceased. A peace sign can be seen on it. Sometimes, when the mayor is standing at the traffic lights, she watches people react. On this day they run over it as if nobody cares anymore.