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Ex-CDU politician Otte (archive image): Party exclusion is final
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Kay Nietfeld / dpa
The former chairman of the controversial "Union of Values", Max Otte, has been expelled from the CDU.
The CDU district party court in Cologne followed the request of the CDU federal executive board “because of party-damaging behavior”, the CDU Cologne announced on Wednesday in Düsseldorf.
Since Otte did not raise an objection by the end of the period on August 1, he was "now legally no longer a member of the CDU".
The Cologne CDU welcomes the district party court's decision because it "reaffirms very clearly that any type of cooperation with the AfD violates the principles of the CDU and has consequences under party law".
The exclusion procedure was initiated after the 57-year-old economics professor ran for the office of Federal President in mid-February at the suggestion of the AfD.
Otte caused a stir during the election because he was the only candidate who was absent from the presentation at the beginning of the Federal Assembly.
Before the election, it had already become known that Otte had donated 20,000 euros to the AfD district association in Görlitz, Saxony, at the beginning of last year.
AfD boss Tino Chrupalla is a member of the Görlitz district association, from February 2017 to October 2021 he was its chairman.
Otte was a member of the CDU for a good 30 years.
As early as April, he had announced during the ongoing proceedings that he would not oppose being thrown out.
He had already resigned at the end of January as the chairman of the “Values Union”, which is not an official association of the CDU, but sees itself as a “conservative grassroots movement” in the Union.
The Cologne CDU boss Bernd Petelkau said that Otte's behavior seriously violated the principles and values of the party.
"I am glad that the district party court has punished this serious case of party-damaging behavior with the only correct consequence: the exclusion from our party."
sol/dpa