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Düsseldorf (dpa / lnw) - The North Rhine-Westphalian SPD has slipped below the symbolically important mark of 100,000 members.

According to the party, the national association of social democrats in Germany with the largest number of members still had a good 99,000 members at the beginning of December.

That was around 4,000 fewer than a year earlier.

The largest people's party in North Rhine-Westphalia is still the CDU, but it also shrank by 1265 to just under 121,700 members by the end of October.

The Greens are still on the rise, exceeding 20,000 for the first time in 2020 and counting 21,776 members in December.

The Greens have now overtaken the FDP, which has around 17,500 members.

Die Linke NRW, which now has more than 8830 members in North Rhine-Westphalia, was also pleased about a modest increase of around 460 members.

The AfD in North Rhine-Westphalia had a good 5400 members at the beginning of December.

SPD

: The corona crisis affected all parties and made it difficult to mobilize new members.

In addition, the NRW municipal election campaign in late summer had to be largely digital.

"The restriction of party activities and the focus on digital formats made it difficult to address interested target groups and make newcomers to the party work," says SPD General Secretary Nadja Lüders.

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A small ray of hope: Compared to the previous year, the number of party withdrawals in the SPD fell by a good 900 to 4936.

In 2019, more than 5850 members of the SPD had turned their backs.

The NRW-SPD was able to gain a good 2,400 new members in 2020, but in 2019 it was still almost 3,100.

The NRW Social Democrats are now hoping for new momentum in 2020: "The upcoming federal election campaign is a great opportunity for mobilization that we will use," says Lüders.

The SPD is also hoping for new members in the state election year 2022.

However, the NRW-SPD currently still offers a divided picture.

There is a power struggle over the party leadership between the incumbent state chairman Sebastian Hartmann and the influential state parliamentary group leader Thomas Kutschaty.

CDU:

The Christian Democrats had almost 5,300 entries and around 3,970 exits by October 2020.

With almost 121,700 members, the NRW-CDU is still the largest regional association.

"The figures show: Despite all prophecies of doom and under Corona conditions, political engagement in the CDU is still highly attractive," says Secretary General Josef Hovenjürgen.

"The CDU is the people's party in North Rhine-Westphalia."

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GRÜNE:

In 2020, the Greens not only celebrated their successes in the local elections, but also the steady growth.

By the beginning of December, the number of members rose by 2,790 or 14.7 percent to 21,776. Almost 42 percent are female, and every sixth member of the Greens is under 30 years of age.

The average age is around 48 years.

“In spring 2020 we exceeded the 20,000 member mark for the first time.

A historic moment », sums up the management duo Mona Neubaur and Felix Banaszak.

"People want to continue to campaign for climate protection, social justice, a different transport policy and a restructuring of the economy."

FDP:

The FDP is feeling the consequences of the pandemic.

The Liberals in North Rhine-Westphalia have stabilized at the previous year's level with more than 17,500 members.

Many new members could be won in the local election campaign.

However, the FDP felt that local membership recruitment was restricted by the pandemic, especially in this particular year.

DIE LINKE:

Die Linke is not represented in the state parliament in NRW.

Nevertheless, it grew to a good 8,830 members in 2020.

The party had the most admissions among 21 to 30 year olds.

Among the members as a whole, younger people up to the age of 30 now make up far more than a quarter.

More and more women are also joining the left.

“The state association of North Rhine-Westphalia has become younger and more female in 2020,” the party sums up.

The 2020 local elections gave the left a boost.

It recorded the greatest growth in Cologne and other university cities.

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AfD:

The number of members in NRW fell within a year by around 230 to 5636. However, according to the party, around 190 people were still in the admission process at the beginning of December.

The AfD has also cleaned up its card index and terminated around 170 members who did not contribute.

Development of membership numbers in NRW-SPD