Demonstration against AfD in Munich: Söder and Aiwanger are at odds again

bBetween the CSU and Free Voters, the parties that form the state government in Bavaria, there are strongly differing opinions on how the demonstration “Together against the right – for democracy and diversity” should be assessed. It was canceled on Sunday because the crowd – around 100,000 people according to the police – was too big. Bavarian Prime Minister Markus Söder, who, contrary to what CDU leader Friedrich Merz claimed on Sunday evening, was not at the demonstration in Munich, described the rallies in numerous cities over the weekend as a “very good signal”. At the same time, they are a “wake-up call for the traffic lights to change many things,” said the CSU chairman on Monday in the ZDF “Morgenmagazin”.

The Deputy Prime Minister of Bavaria, Hubert Aiwanger, said on Platform He expects “all democrats and the federal government to distance themselves from left-wing extremists,” said the Free Voters leader, who has recently been a frequent guest at farmers’ and truck drivers’ rallies and always claimed to be in the interests of the majority of the population to speak.

While Aiwanger has not yet commented on the extent to which he sees the hundreds of thousands of participants at the weekend as an expression of the will of the majority, Söder said with regard to the demonstrators: “The very large majority were commoners, were representatives of the normal middle of society.” However, Söder sees it According to reports, it is quite critical that the initiators attempted to declare not only Aiwanger but also CSU politicians as undesirables and to lump them together with the AfD. “But what do CSU politicians want on site?” wrote the far-left, very protest-experienced activist Lisa Poettinger on Platform X.

“I’m not interested in rights of any kind”

“As the leader of the meeting, I can say that I have no desire for rights of any kind!” Ludwig Spaenle, Munich CSU politician and anti-Semitism commissioner for the state government, then canceled his participation in the demonstration in protest. Poettinger “apparently doesn’t know what she can do with this political bullying by putting the democratic spectrum in the right corner,” Spaenle told “Focus online”.

The Bavarian Justice Minister Georg Eisenreich (CSU) particularly criticized the climate movement Fridays for Future, which had also called for the demonstrations. He welcomed the fact that so many were “taking to the streets for our democratic values,” said Eisenreich, who ultimately took part in the demonstration. But he asked himself “why so many of the organizers were so quiet” when the focus in recent months was on “showing solidarity with the Jews in our country,” Eisenreich told the “Süddeutsche Zeitung”. He wondered whether Fridays for Future was “a legitimate organizer of such a demonstration against extremism.” The German branch of the movement distanced itself “only half-heartedly” from Greta Thunberg’s “unspeakable statements” – which the Munich group rejected.

Different assessments of the protests also emerged within the Free Voters. The head of the state parliamentary group, Florian Streibl, thanked “everyone” who “was there and sent this magnificent signal against the right and for our Free State.” Former Education Minister Michael Piazolo, whom Aiwanger no longer considered for the cabinet, also spoke of an “important demonstration against the right.” On the other hand, Digital Minister Fabian Mehring said: “I'm afraid the AfD cannot be 'demonstrated away'. Right-wing populism does not shrink through counter-protest – in the worst case, it actually grows as a result.”