Kurt Biedenkopf's death and the reactions to it: "Motor of German Unity"

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Kurt Biedenkopf in 2019

Photo: Hendrik Schmidt / picture alliance / dpa / dpa-Zentralbild

After the death of the long-standing Saxon Prime Minister Kurt Biedenkopf, politicians and companions pay tribute to the work of the CDU great.

Biedenkopf died on Thursday evening at the age of 91.

He was the first Saxon Prime Minister after reunification and ruled the state from 1990 to 2002. Born in Ludwigshafen and graduated in law, he was considered a close confidante of the former CDU chairman and ex-Federal Chancellor Helmut Kohl.

Later there were differences between the two.

Biedenkopf was temporarily head of the CDU regional association in North Rhine-Westphalia and a member of both the Bundestag (1976–1980) and the Düsseldorf state parliament (1980–1988).

Federal President Frank-Walter Steinmeier

praised the politician as a "symbol of the internal unity" of Germany.

"Together with many people in our country, I am grateful for his great contribution to the merging of East and West during these hours," Steinmeier wrote in a letter of condolence to Biedenkopf's widow Ingrid Biedenkopf.

Saxony's incumbent

Prime Minister Michael Kretschmer (CDU)

had previously called Biedenkopf a "great Saxony". "As Prime Minister from 1990 to 2002, he laid the foundations for the successful development of our homeland," wrote Kretschmer in a press release. “Saxony was Kurt Biedenkopf's home, and at the same time he was at home in the world. He was internationally networked, a gifted speaker and explainer of the world situation and always thought far beyond the day. "Biedenkopf will" have a permanent place in Saxon history, "wrote Kretschmer.

"He was an exceptional politician, a statesman and a father in the best sense of the word," said the CDU chairman and

Union Chancellor candidate Armin Laschet

in Berlin. As the first Prime Minister of the Free State of Saxony, Biedenkopf was an "engine of German unity". Laschet wrote on Twitter that Biedenkopf had called over and over again "until the last few weeks" and gave advice and support.

Bundestag President Wolfgang Schäuble (CDU)

said that with Biedenkopf, "our country would lose one of its brightest political minds, a far-sighted designer and charismatic Christian Democrat."

He was a "solitaire" in German politics, equally at home in science, business and politics.

Schäuble pointed out that Biedenkopf had already called for a reform of the pension system in the 1970s and advocated the ecological renewal of the market economy in the 1980s.

Saxony's CDU parliamentary group leader Christian Hartmann

described the ex-prime minister as a “lucky find” for Saxony.

"The establishment and positive development of our Free State since 1990 are irrevocably linked to it."

The

AfD parliamentary group in Saxony

, the second strongest force in the Dresden state parliament, wrote in a message that Biedenkopf had "interfered with political events until the end with non-partisan and refreshing statements."

The

Saxon Green State

MP

Franziska Schubert sent

Bidenkopf's family their condolences on behalf of the parliamentary group on Twitter.

"With him, Saxony loses a central political personality," wrote Schubert.

"With Kurt Biedenkopf a great person and influential politician has died," wrote the Saxon

SPD leader Martin Dulig

.

"We had little political or personal connection with Kurt Biedenkopf," wrote the

Saxon left-wing faction

on Twitter.

"But we also recognize that as a conservative intellectual he shaped Saxony after 1990 like no other person."

fek / dpa