Constituent meeting
Aigner’s re-election is overshadowed by the AfD scandal
October 30, 2023, 6:32 p.m
The newly elected state parliament meets for the first time in Bavaria. The focus is on the arrest of an AfD representative. The party reacts with attacks on the judiciary. Aigner, who has been confirmed as President of Parliament in office, speaks of a “perpetrator-victim reversal”.
Ilse Aigner has been re-elected President of the Bavarian State Parliament. The state parliament met for its constituent session around three weeks after the state elections on October 8th in Munich, and a large majority of 164 of the 200 representatives present voted for the 58-year-old. Another big topic at the meeting was the arrest of AfD politician Daniel Halemba.
The 22-year-old was elected to the state parliament for the AfD. However, he was absent from the constituent meeting because he had been arrested near Stuttgart that morning. The Würzburg public prosecutor’s office is conducting an investigation against him for incitement to hatred and the use of symbols of unconstitutional organizations.
Halemba is a member of the Prager Teutonia fraternity. As his lawyer Dubravko Mandic announced at the weekend, there was a house search. According to Mandic, there are other suspects besides Halemba. After his client’s arrest, Mandic said he filed an urgent application with the Bavarian Constitutional Court. The politician, who was born in Poland and grew up in the north of Baden-Württemberg, has been in the spotlight for weeks. The investigators now want to see him in custody because of the risk of blackout.
“One of the foundations of democracy”
At the state parliament session in Munich, AfD MP Christoph Maier spoke of an “absolute scandal”. The leader of the AfD parliamentary group, Katrin Ebner-Steiner, wrote on
In contrast, SPD MP Simone Strohmayr accused the AfD of ridiculing the judiciary. In her speech, Aigner said that neither parliament nor she as president of the state parliament could influence judicial decisions. “This is one of the foundations of democracy.”
The AfD leadership’s reaction to Halemba’s arrest honestly concerns them, Aigner continued. She spoke of a “perpetrator-victim reversal” that aimed to destroy trust in democratic institutions. The AfD’s reaction is therefore a “targeted attack on the institutions of our democracy.” They are “conspiracy myths”. Green Party President Paul Knoblach spoke out against populism at the opening of the meeting. He wants to “exaggerate problems and not solve them”.
Five parties are represented in the new Bavarian state parliament with a total of 203 members. The CSU has 85 seats, the Free Voters 37. The opposition leader is the AfD, which achieved the third best state election results and, like the Greens, has 32 seats. The SPD, with 17 seats, is the smallest parliamentary group. Tomorrow, Tuesday, Markus Söder is to be re-elected as Prime Minister.