Thursday November 11, 2021
Free voter boss changes opinion
Aiwanger is vaccinated now
Hubert Aiwanger has long resisted a corona vaccination. The result is a week-long dispute with coalition partner CSU. Now the head of the Free Voters apparently changes his mind. The reason for this is the increasing congestion in hospitals.
Bavaria’s Deputy Prime Minister and Chairman of the Free Voters, Hubert Aiwanger, had himself vaccinated against Corona after a long resistance. “I am now vaccinated against Corona and can still attend 2G appointments in November,” he said. Aiwanger justified his decision with the difficult situation in the clinics, which are confronted with rapidly increasing numbers of corona intensive care patients. “That also helps to relieve hospitals.”
During the federal election campaign there had been weeks of clashes with the CSU. Prime Minister Markus Söder had sharply criticized Aiwanger’s initial skepticism about vaccinations and told him that members of the government had to be role models. CSU politicians had also accused Aiwanger of wanting to catch votes in the camp of lateral thinkers and anti-vaccination opponents.
The free voter boss emphasized that he was not an opponent of vaccinations: “I said in the summer that I was considering the vaccination and that the course of the disease is milder, especially in people at risk with corona vaccination.” Aiwanger did not give details of his vaccination and confirmed that he did not want to turn it into a show.
Aiwanger also came under increasing pressure within its own party. The Bavarian state parliament member Fabian Mehring appealed previously in the “Augsburger Allgemeine” to the role model function of his party colleague. Due to the 2G rule, it is also difficult for the Deputy Prime Minister of Bavaria to exercise his public office without being vaccinated. “His call for normality is only credible if he has been vaccinated himself,” said Mehring.