display

He looked changed.

Björn Höcke picked up the microphone more often than ever before at an AfD federal party conference.

The Thuringian regional chief stayed out of the leadership quarrels of his party as far as possible.

Rather, the protagonist of the officially disbanded wing, classified as right-wing extremist by the Office for the Protection of the Constitution, almost consistently commented on the matter at the weekend in Dresden.

Most of the time, the majority of the approximately 560 delegates followed him.

So this party congress became Björn Höcke's triumphal procession.

This was possible because Höcke put content before personnel issues.

He and his highly concentrated, very well organized supporters hit the weakest point of the less radical camp around party leader Jörg Meuthen.

This had prepared itself for the personnel - for the determination of the top candidates for the Bundestag election - and had assumed that the not so dramatic lead motion for the election program would go through without major debates.

But it turned out quite differently.

The controversial top candidate question was passed on to the membership on Saturday, who should decide by the end of May which two people - ideally according to east-west proportionality - should represent the program.

Who does it then is open.

The other party leader Tino Chrupalla from Saxony can be considered as set.

On the other hand, according to the current status, the Bundestag member Joana Cotar from Hesse, parliamentary group leader Alice Weidel from Baden-Württemberg and the North Rhine-Westphalian state chairman Rüdiger Lucassen could be considered for the representation of the western state associations.

But because the decision on this was postponed to the grassroots at the party congress, the way was clear in Dresden for setting the course.

display

They began with the adoption of a corona resolution on Saturday that Höcke “fully” supported and according to which protective measures should be completely voluntary.

It should be "left to the responsible citizens", it says there, "to what extent they want to protect themselves".

The obligation to protect fellow human beings from infection through one's own behavior in the pandemic was in fact rejected.

Accordingly, a narrow majority decided on Sunday to include this sentence in the program: “We reject the obligation to wear a mask.” With this sentence, the AfD officially makes common with the “lateral thinker” milieu.

It was noteworthy in the debate that no leading figure in the Meuthen camp, not even the party leader himself, contradicted and tried to prevent this extreme escalation.

It was exactly the same when a dramatic tightening was added to the migration chapter.

After Höcke had spoken out in favor of the "political message" of an amendment and there was no counter-speech from the party leadership, the delegates voted for the "rejection of any family reunification for refugees".

display

And after a lengthy and at times chaotic debate, the delegates voted to exchange their migration policy role model.

So far, in all its immigration aversions, the AfD had still pleaded for qualified immigration to be made possible according to the Canadian or Australian model.

The less radical camp referred to the appreciation of these models as evidence of their own cosmopolitanism.

But after Höcke had warned of a “cultural meltdown” in Germany through immigration at the party congress, the delegates decided to turn around: “The goal of an identity-preserving migration policy cannot be the Canadian or Australian model of underpopulated giant states, but only the Japanese model of one that corresponds to the national structure strict limitation and control ”, it says now in the election manifesto.

For Höcke it was a special triumph insofar as he had already spoken in 2019 at the Kyffhauser meeting of the then officially still existing wing in favor of a “programmatic shift of our party” and, instead of orienting itself towards Canada or Australia, called for an orientation towards the very rigid immigration policy of Japan.

"We consider an exit to be necessary"

display

However, Höcke was not directly involved in what is probably the most spectacular change in the AfD's program - even if it is undoubtedly in his interest.

On Saturday afternoon it was decided that the party now demands the Dexit, the "exit from the EU", as an amendment that was accepted by a majority is headed.

It says unmistakably without any clauses or conditioning: "We consider Germany's exit from the European Union and the establishment of a new European economic and interest group to be necessary."

Two things were noteworthy in the debate.

On the one hand, Höcke did not even have to speak out in favor of the application because an alliance between the wing camp and the radical economic libertarians who are critical of the state and who have always attacked the EU had formed on the subject.

The Bundestag member Peter Boehringer, chairman of the Bundestag's budget committee, belongs to this camp and had few problems in advocating the application because, on the other hand, the opponents of the Dexit promotion did not put forward any substantive arguments.

Meuthen only objected that one should not leave the EU because one could ensure a change in the community in its parliament together with right-wing groups from other countries.

Group leader Alexander Gauland said that a dexit could trigger concerns among European neighbors about another German “Sonderweg”.

But nobody knew how to defend the content of the EU and to highlight the single market or the free movement of people as achievements.

Rather, there were only tactical concerns about the application.

It was no different when a representative of the less radical camp merely countered an application supported by Höcke for a Bundeswehr tradition maintenance with a lot of "corps spirit" and very little historical criticism that the voters did not want to hear such a thing.

It was not said that there were substantive reasons for restricting the maintenance of military traditions - so there was no reason for the delegates not to agree to the proposal.

In total, the AfD election program was brought to the line of the wing supporters at numerous important points against the draft of the lead motion.

And the Meuthen camp found that it was unable to provide any strong substantive arguments against it.

In Dresden, the less radical acted like a mere staff union, which, when it is not about staff, is overrun by the programmatically determined representatives on the far right.

On Saturday he revealed what self-confidence Höcke developed.

There he said in front of journalists, "that in my opinion Mr. Meuthen does not have the deep political-historical-philosophical consciousness to lead this party in its position".