The far-right AfD cannot bring Germany to a good place

This week's Independent News & Media Irish regional newspapers' column.

Michael Commane

Watching German television during the weekend of November 9/10, which gave much air time to the 30th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall, I was tempted to retire from my job, pack my bags and head back to Germany and gallivant around the country, moving from place to place but all the time having a bed in Berlin.

There was euphoria in Germany, indeed around the world when the Berlin Wall fell. I cycled through the Brandenburg Gate in East Berlin within weeks of that historic night. I remember chatting with East German police, who were reticent to talk about their politics, their State and their capital city.

Back then it was my non-expert opinion that the German Democratic Republic or East Germany, as we called it, should remain a separate State or country from the Federal Republic of Germany or West Germany as we knew it.

Bonn, the capital of West Germany since 1949, was always considered a temporary capital, waiting for unification to happen.

However, unification was more a far-off dream than any sort of real political aspiration.

But in August 1990 the Parliament of East Germany passed a resolution declaring the accession of the German Democratic Republic to the Federal Republic of Germany, effective from October 3, 1990. So within 12 months of the fall of the Wall the two separate countries suddenly found themselves merged.

The Bonn Parliament moved to a refurbished Reichstag in Berlin in 1999. Berlin was back as the powerhouse of Germany.

Good or bad? The jury might still be out on that. Over the last 100 years the history of Germans with their capital in Berlin is not the most impressive.

There was World War I, the weak Weimar Republic, then came the Hitler terror, followed by East Berlin as the capital of Communist East Germany. The Berlin Wall and the mines and barbed wire that stretched for 1,400 kilometres dividing the two German States gave some insight into what life was like behind the ‘Iron Curtain’. The Communist Party, known as the SED controlled all aspects of life in the country, allowing for no opposition or contrary opinions.

What united Germany has done in 30 years is remarkable. But the big question is, has East Germany been subjugated by West Germany? Very little remains of the old GDR. Somewhat frivolous, but worth noting, one of the few aspects of East German life that has percolated into the West is the little green man with his hat, on traffic lights. That can now be seen across all of Germany.

Germany is politically divided into 16 States or Länder. There were elections last month in the eastern State of Thuringen where the Alternative for Germany (AfD) party won a whopping 26 per cent of the vote making it the second largest political force in the State’s parliament in Erfurt. The AfD is a far-right party, many of whose members have Nazi views.

The party objects to the Holocaust memorial in Berlin and is critical of those who continue to condemn the Nazis.

There is a frightening and worrying move to the right in the world and across Europe but to think that it should be growing at such a rate in Germany is extremely worrying.

A Germany without a wall and barbed-wire is of course a better place but a far-right political party in the country must never be given the oxygen to breathe a single breath. 

The AfD cannot bring Germany to a good place.