As head of government, Michael Kretschmer has very high approval ratings in Saxony.
But when he was re-elected as party leader, it became clear that he was no longer undisputed in his own ranks.
Dresden - The Saxon CDU has confirmed its chairman Michael Kretschmer for another two years in office - but with a rather meager result.
The 46-year-old received an approval of 76.35 percent at a state party conference in Dresden on Saturday.
With 214 votes cast, he received 155 votes, eleven delegates abstained.
Kretschmer thus fared significantly worse than in previous votes.
In 2017 he won 90 percent of the vote in his first election, two years later it was as much as 95.5 percent.
After his election, Kretschmer proposed, as expected, incumbent Alexander Dierks as Secretary General.
He received an almost identical result as the state chairman.
The approval for Dierks was 75.5 percent.
In his speech to around 250 delegates, Kretschmer addressed the situation of the CDU in Germany right from the start. In his view, the Union needs staying power in its renewal. It's not about a sprint. "We have to prepare for a marathon." Kretschmer demanded team spirit and a "real jolt". In the Saxony CDU, too, one had to think about a new departure and broaden its base. 10,000 members were not enough: "We need more people who are committed to this democracy." The CDU must approach these people.
In view of the drastically increasing corona infections, Kretschmer urged consistent action.
“We now have to step on the brakes in a special way.” The development should not go on like this.
“It can't end well.
We don't want a new lockdown.
We want kindergartens and schools to remain open. ”But action must be taken now.
Kretschmer spoke out in favor of offering corona rapid tests again free of charge for everyone.
However, testing alone does not solve the problem.
The current corona wave can only be broken by a radical reduction in contact.
"It is the last exit that comes before a lockdown."
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As a guest speaker at the party congress, Bavaria's Prime Minister Markus Söder (CSU) accused the possible future coalition of the SPD, Greens and FDP for failures in the pandemic. “We now urgently need uniform solutions. The traffic light ducks completely, ”he said. A conference between the prime ministers and the federal government is now necessary. “If Olaf Scholz was at the G20 summit, then he can also go to the G16 with the federal states and finally find uniform rules for Germany. Angela Merkel would not have left the countries alone. ”It was“ a shame and incomprehensible ”that the SPD refused to hold talks. One could not speak of Freedom Day and an end to the pandemic situation if exactly the opposite was happening at the moment.
At the beginning of the party congress, the Saxony CDU remembered its former chairman and Saxon head of government, Kurt Biedenkopf.
He died on August 12 at the age of 91.
With Bernhard Vogel (88) - the former Prime Minister of Rhineland-Palatinate and Thuringia - a companion Biedenkopf held a commemorative speech.
Vogel described Biedenkopf as the master builder of the resurrected Free State of Saxony, as a beacon of hope for the CDU and a formative designer of the Federal Republic of Germany.
"Saxony was a stroke of luck for Biedenkopf and Biedenkopf was a stroke of luck for Saxony." Dpa