An unsolved case of an anti-Semitic hate newspaper and witness reports about right-wing extremist statements: His behavior as a youth catches up with Bavaria’s Economics Minister Aiwanger. The guests agree on Lanz: the 17-year-old Aiwanger can be forgiven for a lot – but not the 52-year-old.
An anti-Semitic inflammatory newspaper has been dividing society in Bavaria and Germany since last weekend. The Bavarian Economics Minister and Deputy Prime Minister Hubert Aiwanger is said to have carried it around in his school bag when he was 17. Whether it was just a single copy, whether he wanted to distribute it: unclear. Aiwanger doesn’t want to be able to remember it anymore. The “Süddeutsche Zeitung” researched the incident at Aiwanger’s school at the time, and since then Aiwanger’s brother has identified himself as the author of the pamphlet. But there are also testimonies according to which today’s Free Voter leader Aiwanger attracted attention in his school days with Hitler imitations and anti-Semitic “jokes”. A witness stated that Aiwanger had shown her a copy of Adolf Hitler’s pamphlet Mein Kampf, which he had carried around with him.
Markus Lanz makes the case a topic in his talk show on ZDF on Wednesday evening. “I’m very much in favor of treating the 17-year-old with leniency when the 52-year-old deals with it responsibly and in an adult manner. And that didn’t happen,” says Green politician Jürgen Trittin. The journalists Roman Deininger from the “Süddeutsche Zeitung” and Helene Bubrowski from the “Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung” also criticize the behavior of the Bavarian politician.
“I like Aiwanger”
Roman Deininger comes from Ingolstadt. He is chief reporter at the “Süddeutsche Zeitung”, which first reported on the anti-Semitic hate newspaper with which Aiwanger is associated. “I like Aiwanger,” he says at Markus Lanz. And that’s how it is for many people, especially in Lower Bavaria, where Aiwanger’s home community is located. Hubsi they call him there. Aiwanger is someone you can imagine drinking a few pints of beer with over a round of Schafkopf in the beer garden around the corner. Unlike most politicians, he is folksy, close to the people. He listens to them, speaks their language. He makes no secret of his origins. He speaks the dialect of his region, but he has his problems with Standard German. That matters. Many people trust him.
Journalist Deininger sees it that way too. “There are many people in Bavaria who show solidarity with him,” he says. “They say the events happened a long time ago.” Prime Minister Söder must also take these people seriously, “otherwise you will drive many into system skepticism.” Deininger shares Trittin’s view: “One should be able to be lenient with a 17-year-old, but the 52-year-old who is in such a high office has to be viewed strictly.”
“Not an anti-Semite since adulthood”
Seen in this way, Aiwanger’s handling of questions and criticism of the process raises questions: Aiwanger made a brief statement on Wednesday afternoon. “I’m neither an anti-Semite nor an extremist. I’m a democrat, a philanthropist, not a misanthrope,” says Aiwanger. “And in this respect I say that I can put my hands on the fire for the last few decades. And what is being discussed here about youth is a bit surprising to me. It is the case that one or the other can be interpreted in one way or another in youth , which I am accused of here as a 15-year-old. But since adulthood: no anti-Semite.”
No one accuses him of that, and certainly not his party, the Free Voters. Jürgen Trittin says: “The party, the Free Voters, doesn’t belong in a far-right corner.” Nevertheless, he accuses Aiwanger of right-wing populist statements. As an example, he cites his speech in front of a good 10,000 people at a demonstration against the traffic light government’s heating law on June 10 in Erding near Munich. Aiwanger had spoken of a silent majority that had to “take democracy back”. “It’s a classic right-wing ideology,” Trittin criticizes Lanz. “That’s anti-democratic. And that’s why the attention that he was in possession of a well-written, anti-Semitic leaflet in his youth has become the fact that it then takes on a different meaning.”
“Show No Remorse”
Bubrowski also criticized the fact that Aiwanger did not admit to the mistakes he made in his youth. In the last five days, Aiwanger has only sent a single tweet in which he was upset about a “smear campaign” by the “Süddeutsche Zeitung”. “Aiwanger has also evolved,” she acknowledges. “But he doesn’t manage to develop an attitude towards it. He shows no remorse.”
And what does Aiwanger’s future look like now? If the Bavarian Prime Minister Markus Söder sticks to his statements, Nico Fried, head of politics at “Stern”, could be right: the provisional end of Aiwanger’s office as state minister is likely to be imminent. Söder had asked for “complete clarification” in a statement on Tuesday afternoon. At the same time he explained that nothing new should be added now. But that happened because of the testimonies reported by Bayerischer Rundfunk, “Süddeutsche” and “Bild” since Tuesday evening.