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New valuesUnion boss Max Otte
Photo: Karlheinz Schindler / dpa
Right-wing economist Max Otte is the new chairman of the conservative values union.
At the weekend he was elected to succeed Alexander Mitsch, Mitsch was no longer running.
Now, after the change in leadership, criticism of the personnel is loud across all parties.
SPD General Secretary Lars Klingbeil has called on the CDU to make a clear break with the Values Union.
Klingbeil described Otte's election as a »coup of the AfD loyalists«.
From CDU boss Armin Laschet and general secretary Paul Ziemiak he now expects "the clear announcement that those who are in the values union, who openly reach out to the AfD, that they will be thrown out of the union."
"Too weak to stop the CDU's shift to the right"
He feared, however, that there will be »again just fine words without consequence«: »Mr. Laschet is too weak to stop the right-wing shift of the CDU." This is not a good signal before the election in Saxony-Anhalt, "before the increasing numbers of forces promote cooperation with the AfD in the state CDU, "said Klingbeil.
The Value Union is a group of conservative Christian Democrats.
She argues that the CDU under Angela Merkel has moved too far to the left and must again take more conservative positions.
It operates as a registered association and is not one of the official party affiliations.
The federal CDU is the value union because of its frequent criticism of the official party course a thorn in the side.
AfD proximity and guest on conspiratorial blogs
The new chairman Otte is controversial.
On his website he describes himself as a »philanthropist, publicist, patriot«; he has been a CDU member since 1991.
Politically, he has been offending with right-wing statements for years and has repeatedly defended the AfD.
In 2017 he told the “Wirtschaftswoche” that the AfD was “not right-wing extremist” except for Björn Höcke.
Rather, the AfD is "90 percent a bourgeois-conservative party."
From June 2018 to January 2021 he was chairman of the board of trustees of the AfD-affiliated Desiderius Erasmus Foundation.
In the past he also made election recommendations for the party, and on a YouTube conspiracy channel he described criticism of right-wing extremism as "incitement against the right".
In the case of the murdered CDU politician Walter Lübcke, Otte spoke on Twitter of agitation against rights.
The ValuesUnion wanted to exclude him from the party for these statements almost two years ago - now they have elected him as chairman.
Otte then deleted his statement on Twitter and called it a "mistake" there.
An exclusion of Otte from the CDU would automatically have resulted in his exclusion as a full member of the Values Union - but this was not realized.
Outrage among CDU politicians
In addition to Klingbeil, CDU politicians were also outraged about the election.
The CDU member of the Bundestag Volker Ullrich called the Values Union "a group that is clearly and distinctly far outside the CDU and CSU".
The former CDU General Secretary Ruprecht Polenz sees the values of the Values Union no longer compatible with the CDU.
The association was "organized as a party within the party and is doing massive damage to the Union," he wrote on Twitter.
Otte shows the "demon" of the values union.
And the Berlin CDU candidate Peter Mair called Otte a "right-wing radical" and called for a decision on incompatibility between memberships in the CDU and the values union.
FDP General Secretary Volker Wissing also referred to the CDU Bundestag candidates in Thuringia, Maaßen, and Otte via Twitter.
He wrote that the Union must be careful that the vacuum left by Chancellor Angela Merkel is not filled by right-wing populists.
Green Federal Managing Director Michael Kellner wrote on Twitter that he expected CDU leader Armin Laschet to follow his words with deeds and to draw a "clear firewall against the far right."
His party colleague Konstantin von Notz also wrote on Twitter that this firewall was "obviously easily inflammable".
He accused CDU leader Laschet of inactivity.
mrc / AFP