The far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party is holding its congress this weekend. It comes after a difficult few months for the movement. Its leadership is due for a change, and the leaders’ score will show whether delegates hold it against them for a troubled campaign with a middling result. The AfD, on the other hand, is in pole position for three regional elections in the fall, in which the party is coming out on top everywhere.
2 mins
With our correspondent in Berlin, Pascal Thibaut
A total of 600 AfD delegates and several tens of thousands of demonstrators outside protested against the holding of the far-right party congress. The city of Essen in the Ruhr area will be under siege this weekend. The municipality had tried in vain to terminate the rental contract concluded by the AfD.
The Gruga hall was the scene of another congress in 2015 where the young party, in a heated atmosphere, unloaded its founding president who then suffered an unprecedented humiliation.
This weekend, 100,000 demonstrators are expected to try, not to prevent this congress, but at least to make it more complicated.
Hans Starck, professor of German civilization at the Sorbonne
Will the atmosphere be more peaceful for this new edition? The AfD has had difficult months behind it with scandals surrounding supposed funding from Russia and China, a leading candidate for the European elections sidelined and an exclusion of its deputies from the Identity and Democracy group in Brussels, the AfD being considered too sulphurous, notably by the National Rally.
Read alsoEuropean elections: weighed down by scandals, the German far right launches its campaign
The party’s score on the evening of June 9 was below the expectations of the Alternative for Germany. But the 16% obtained at the same time meant substantial progress compared to the 2019 European elections.
The party probably wants to draw a line under these difficult months and concentrate on three regional elections in the East in September, where the AfD is coming out on top everywhere and is counting on triumphing.
Also listenGerman elections: “There is a handkerchief between the Social Democrats, the Greens and the AfD”