Christian Bernreiter of the
conservative Bavarian CSU party, above left, inside his office in
Deggendorf, Germany.
Bavarians
at the gate
The
message from the front line: Germany can’t keep taking refugees.
By JANOSCH DELCKER
11/20/15, 5:30 AM CET Updated 11/20/15, 7:53 AM CET
DEGGENDORF, Germany
— When Bavaria’s state premier gets a text message from Christian
Bernreiter, which is
a pretty regular occurrence these days, he reacts instantly,
according to fellow members of their conservative regional party, the
Christian Social Union (CSU).
As well as a direct
line to state premier Horst Seehofer, the softly-spoken local
administrator has the rapt attention of Angela Merkel’s government
in Berlin: Bernreiter’s district of Deggendorf, near the Czech and
Austrian borders, is on the front line in Europe’s refugee crisis.
In true German fashion, he is unstinting with his blunt opinions and
advice.
“Chancellor Merkel
promised us as early as September 28 that she’ll work day and night
to reduce the numbers of refugees,” he told POLITICO at his office,
seated beneath a crucifix and a framed Bavarian landscape. “But we
don’t have much time left.”
It many ways, it’s
fortunate for Europe that this prosperous and highly-organized German
region has become the gateway for hundreds of thousands of migrants —
some estimate as many as 1.5 million by year’s end — seeking
shelter or a better life in the country with Europe’s strongest
economy and, so far, the most welcoming attitude towards refugees
from the Syrian war.
The federal
government, which is under assault from disgruntled Bavarian
politicians with disproportionate weight in German national politics
who want the influx of refugees brought under control, doesn’t
always see it that way.
“The whole
situation would be different if the refugees entered through any
other state but Bavaria,” complained one official in Berlin, who
spoke on condition of anonymity.
The CSU exists only
in Bavaria, where its federal partner, Merkel’s Christian Democrats
(CDU), do not stand for elections. At national level the CSU forms a
parliamentary group with the CDU, known as the “Union,” giving
the Bavarian party three national ministries in the “grand
coalition” government between the conservatives and the Social
Democrats.
In the same way that
the CSU blurs the border between regional and federal politics, the
refugee crisis blurs the distinction between local politics and
geopolitics. Nowhere is this more apparent than rural districts like
Deggendorf and nearby Passau, which must now cope in just a few days
with the number of refugees that some major EU countries are willing
to accept in a few years.
“There were weeks
of negotiations when it was about saving Greece and other states, and
they were primarily asking for German solidarity,” said Bernreiter.
“Now they turn away, and say ‘This is just the Germans’
problem.’”
Tell it to Merkel
His counterpart
Franz Meyer in rural Passau, which is right on the Austrian border,
said Germany was one of only a handful of EU countries stepping up to
the plate.
“When I hear that,
for instance, France wants to take in 25,000 refugees within the next
two years — in the Passau area, that’s the number of arrivals
within three days. When I hear that the Czech Republic has received
1,000 applications for asylum since January — that’s
approximately the number of refugees coming across the
Bavarian-Austrian border in two hours,” he said.
In his office by
Passau’s baroque cathedral, Meyer said his district currently
houses 1,800 asylum seekers and will need 1,000 more beds in coming
months. Simply put, Passau has taken on more refugees already than
some European nations. “More solidarity is needed,” he said.
This is a message
the German chancellor will hear in person from her Bavarian cousins
this weekend, when she attends the CSU party congress in Munich. The
politicians from Deggendorf, Passau and other deluged communities
like Freilassing are looking to party leader Seehofer to channel
their frustration and expectations for change, in what will be a
tough session for Merkel.
Her speech is
pointedly scheduled straight after a vote among delegates on whether
to call for an upper limit to the number of refugees the country
should accept. At a time when nearby states like Austria, Slovenia
and Hungary are erecting fences to control the flow of refugees,
Bavaria does not propose interfering with the Schengen area, aware
that nobody has benefited from the EU’s open borders — and common
currency — more than German exporters.
Neither does the CSU
voice openly anti-immigrant sentiment. Germany’s history of
oppression weighs on all mainstream politicians and railing against
refugees is the terrain of fringe right-wing groups like the
anti-Islam PEGIDA or the xenophobic National Democrats (NPD).
The way the
Bavarians see it, Merkel’s decision in September to take in
thousands of Syrians camped out at Budapest’s train station opened
the floodgates. While Bavaria’s initial positive reaction prompted
heartwarming scenes of solidarity in Munich’s railway station,
nobody anticipated they would arrive in such numbers. Local leaders
like Meyer say it “sent a wrong signal. It’s the task of local
politicians to demand that the stream of refugees should be limited.”
“At
some point, the last gym will be filled” —
Christian
Bernreiter, Deggendorf district.
Bernreiter, a
51-year-old engineer who is the spokesman for a pressure group of
Bavaria’s 71 district leaders, will ensure Seehofer stays on
message at the congress: “I’m in constant contact with him.
Premier Seehofer stands close by our side. He knows what’s going on
on the ground.”
Just in case the
message doesn’t get across loud and clear, however, Bernreiter has
twice in recent weeks taken a break from local duties, like giving
local firemen long-service awards, to travel to Berlin with dozens of
colleagues to lobby the chancellor in person. Appearing on TV
alongside Merkel’s point man on the refugee crisis, cabinet chief
Peter Altmaier, he warned that Bavaria’s capacity to house refugees
in disused public buildings and school sports halls would soon be
exhausted: “At some point, the last gym will be filled.”
Hegemony
The chancellor’s
man toured Bavarian refugee centers a fortnight later and told
reporters: “I got the message.” There followed a compromise
between Merkel, Seehofer and SPD leader Sigmar Gabriel to reform
German asylum rules. Since November 1 it has been faster to process
aslyum requests and return unsuccessful applicants, while handouts
have been cut in a nod to those who complain that many migrants,
especially from the Balkans, have purely financial motives.
Meyer from Passau
said such measures help “restore order, but they don’t reduce the
stream of refugees. We need better protection of Europe’s external
borders. This is something the German government has to push through
in Brussels, that’s the decisive step.”
There is more than a
touch of theatrics in the CSU’s ongoing revolt against Merkel’s
open-doors policy, which appears aimed at a domestic, Bavarian
audience. Although Merkel was reportedly furious at Seehofer’s
decision in September to invite her Hungarian nemesis, Prime Minister
Viktor Orbán, to a Bavarian party congress, she knows Seehofer won’t
do anything to endanger his party’s national influence via the CDU,
just as he knows she won’t jettison the support of the Bavarian
conservatives who have run the region almost uninterrupted in the
post-war period.
“Everything the
party does — including its actions within the national government —
is meant to contribute to the goal of remaining the hegemonic party
in Bavaria. That’s decisive for the CSU,” said Frank Decker, a
politics professor at the University of Bonn.
“Everything
the party does … is meant to contribute to the goal of remaining
the hegemonic party in Bavaria” — Frank Decker,
politics professor.
This helps explain
why, although many German regions and municipalities are straining
under the influx of refugees, Merkel is subject to more criticism
from her Bavarian allies than, for example, her sometime rivals in
the SPD. The regionally-based CSU is much more susceptible than
parties with a national base to “changing moods in local politics,”
said Decker.
Seehofer, a
towering, white-haired 66-year-old, is additionally vulnerable since
announcing that he will step down from all his posts in 2018, opening
up the leadership stakes to the likes of the ambitious and outspoken
Bavarian finance minister, Markus Söder, who is 18 years his junior
and potentially even more likely to use the refugee crisis, and
related issues, for political ends.
In the wake of the
Paris attacks, Söder tweeted: “We must not allow illegal and
uncontrolled immigration.” He was accused on social media of using
the tragedy in Paris to stir up sentiment against refugees. A day
later, in a newspaper interview, he said: “Paris changes
everything.”
Authors:
Janosch Delcker
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