“Religious fanaticism” – CDU district administrator settles accounts with the Greens and climate policy

The district administrator in Greiz, Thuringia, Martina Schweinsburg (CDU), has criticized the policy of the traffic light government in Berlin with exceptionally sharp words, attacking the Greens in particular.

In the current “district journal” of the district of Greiz, the Christian Democrat accuses the political leaders in the federal government and in the state of Thuringia of “religious fanaticism in the fight against climate change” and wrong handling of the AfD.

“Berlin really hasn’t heard the shot yet”

The 64-year-old CDU politician, who has been Greiz’ district administrator since 1994 and president of the Thuringian district council since 2012, wrote verbatim: “Has anyone in Berlin or Erfurt understood that downright religious fanaticism will not lead to anything in combating climate change?” She herself doubts that. “Berlin really hasn’t heard the shot yet.”

Schweinsburg cites the heating law as a specific example. Political leaders “ramble on about the fact that people need to be convinced,” said the district administrator.

“Are you crazy? From what please? Do you want to convert the little house that has just been renovated or built and paid off even more expensively? Should someone in rural areas be persuaded to take the train to work or somewhere else at lower fares if their place of residence or destination no longer has any train connection at all and the train is either unpunctual or on strike anyway?” writes Schweinsburg. “In rural areas we are dependent on our car.”

Reckoning with “climate stickers” and green “world saviors”

The CDU district administrator continued: “Billions are being spent on the war in Germany with the approval of former pacifists, money that we ourselves urgently need for roads, schools, teachers, the health system and infrastructure. Wind turbines are to be built no matter what, without creating capacity for transporting and storing the electricity.”

“Where do the self-proclaimed saviors of the world get the right to intervene in our lives in this way?” asks the local politician, in whose district almost 100,000 people live. “Preaching water and drinking wine, being climate glue and flying to Mexico on vacation are just as incompatible as spending millions on champagne and appetizers in the missionary Foreign Ministry.”

The CDU woman also does not leave a good hair when the established parties deal with the AfD and their voters.

With obvious reference to AfD successes in the recent local elections in Sonneberg and Saxony-Anhalt, the district administrator writes: “The firewall that was once formulated has collapsed, and these ungrateful people are voting for those who shouldn’t have voted.” Referring to the peaceful revolution in the GDR, she adds: “It is probably being ignored that we Ossis can tear down walls, we really have experience there.”

AfD successes: voters in the East are “immune” to insults

Schweinsburg criticizes many politicians for their stance on the AfD: “Who has publicly attacked every real or alleged verbal blunder again and again and thus signaled to the voters who they are not allowed to vote for?”

This strategy drove even more people into the arms of the AfD. Voter abuse would miss their target, so the CDU politician. “The ungrateful and mysterious Ossi is now immune to insults.”

With regard to the state elections in 2024 in Thuringia and Saxony, among other places, she explains: “The fact is that elections will not be won in the states of Central Germany with a low population, but they will be lost here.”

In conclusion, she advises a rethink in politics and the media, which should “question their own actions”: It would be appropriate “to take the people seriously and not always hit them and rant straight away when the people speak their mother tongue and tick the applicants approved by the election officer and the election committee on the ballot paper.”

Schweinsburg: “Democracy emanates from the people.”

Grüner: “Another step in the CDU towards AfD”

The contribution of the CDU district administrator is hotly debated on social media. “Clear words from a Thuringian district administrator!” says Martin Henkel, economic policy spokesman for the CDU parliamentary group. The AfD district association Chemnitz explains: “There are still politicians in the CDU with a clear mind!”

The Green Member of Parliament Olaf Müller also comments: “Another step in the CDU in the direction of the AfD.”

Schweinsburg explained to the “Ostthüringer Zeitung” that she had received “only positive reactions” to her text so far. Top politicians from Saxony called and said that finally someone dared to do it. “Unfortunately, that also means, in reverse, that many do not yet or no longer dare.”

Schweinsburg emphasized that she was acting on the principle of talking to “all democratically elected parties”. “I did the same with the PDS right after 1990, against many attacks from my party at the time.” She makes no difference: “I know a lot of sensible people in the left. And not everyone in the AfD is extremist,” said Schweinsburg.

Schweinsburg: Björn Höcke is “not the party”

As early as 2019, Schweinsburg had warned of a “fire wall” against the AfD and advocated a pragmatic approach to the party. Björn Höcke was “not the party”, emphasized the CDU woman at the time. “Since this year I have had an AfD group of nine people in the district, with whom you can work very reasonably, objectively and in a result-oriented manner.”

For reasons of age, Schweinsburg will not be able to run again as a district administrator in 2024. Instead, she wants to run as a Greizer CDU direct candidate for the Thuringian state parliament.