Analysis
AfD
‘extremist’ label sets up political high-wire act for Friedrich Merz
Kate
Connolly
in Berlin
Incoming
chancellor must now decide whether to ban flourishing far-right party amid
widespread discontent
German spy
agency labels AfD as ‘confirmed rightwing extremist’ force
Fri 2 May
2025 19.22 BST
The decision
by Germany’s domestic spy agency to call the far-right Alternative für
Deutschland party “extremist” amounts to the starkest move yet by authorities
to try to stop the advance of the populist political force.
Friday’s
classification by the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution
(BfV) will open up the possibility for the security services to monitor the
country’s largest opposition party, including by recruiting people to inform
against it and enabling interception of its communications.
AfD leaders
denounced it as a “blow against democracy”, and nothing short of an attempt to
disfranchise the more than 10 million people who voted for it in February’s
election.
Its leaders
vowed to take legal action against what they called “defamatory” and
“politically motivated attacks”.
According to
the experts who compiled the BfV’s 1,100-page report, the AfD is “a racist and
anti-Muslim organisation”, which, through its strict, ethnically and
ancestrally defined version of who is German and who is not, “deprecates whole
sections of the population in Germany and infringes their human dignity”.
It has also
“incited irrational fears and hostility” in society, steering the blame towards
individuals and groups, the report said.
In itself,
the step is not much of a surprise, although the timing is. The outgoing
interior minister, Nancy Faeser, made the bombshell announcement on what is
effectively her last day in office.
Faeser said
“there was no political influence on the assessment”, despite the AfD’s
insistence to the contrary. But the move puts the incoming conservative-led
government of Friedrich Merz under great pressure, as well as Faeser’s Social
Democrat colleagues, who will be the junior partners in the new coalition that
gets to work next Tuesday.
On the back
of the decision, Merz will now be responsible – on top of the myriad other
challenges in his in-tray – for deciding whether and how to ban the AfD, a
decision that will involve the most precarious of political tightrope walks.
Migration,
Ukraine, Trump and an ailing economy are among the burgeoning issues that he
will also have to tackle with urgency. The growing mood of dissatisfaction over
these and other issues, exacerbated by the six months of political deadlock
that followed the premature collapse of the previous government – which induced
an added layer of nationwide ennui – has already caused the AfD to creep up in
the polls.
Having won
second place in February’s election – doubling its previous result and making
it the strongest opposition party, second only to the conservative CDU/CSU – in
recent days the AfD has come top of the polls for the first time ever.
The ruling
by the BfV is unlikely to put people off supporting the AfD.
Finding a
way to reduce the AfD has been at top of the agenda among all of the political
parties since it emerged as a protest force of professors and academics in 2013
on the back of anger over the euro bailouts. The challenge has only grown in
importance, as the populists – morphing from anti-euro to anti-migrant over
time – have grown their success at the ballot box.
Merz would
like to be seen as a pragmatic rationalist, aiming to reduce the AfD to what he
refers to as the “marginal phenomenon” it once was by addressing the nation’s
concerns, taking the wind out of the sails of the AfD’s successful modus
operandi of inciting fear and insecurity.
Tackling
“irregular” immigration is therefore at the top of his domestic agenda, as he
seeks to address the topic viewed as having added the most fuel to the AfD’s
fire.
But many
others believe it is too late for that, arguing that an extremist
classification, followed by a ban, would be the only way to stop the
flourishing party.
Others say
such a move would be in grave danger of backfiring, arguing that the AfD would
turn such a branding by the state into its own “seal of approval”, which would
serve to enhance its already strong sense of victimhood or martyrdom.
Merz’s
party, the Christian Democratic Union, has been torn over how to deal with the
AfD. Merz tacitly cooperated with the party earlier this year – despite
insisting he would not – to push migration policies through parliament. And on
the local level, his party and the AfD have cooperated on issues such as a
ruling that the German flag should be hoisted in schools.
Jens Spahn,
Merz’s close ally, recently prompted scorn by suggesting the AfD should be
treated as a “normal opposition party”, arguing that excluding the party from
parliamentary procedures only boosted its popularity.
Those who
reject that approach say Friday’s ruling will now give them more justification
to block the party at every opportunity – but they argue that this will only
work if a cross-party consensus prevails.
Sem comentários:
Enviar um comentário