CSU retreat for the first time in Seeon: with Metsola and Rhein
Created: 12/21/2022, 1:35 p.m
By: Christian Deutschländer
Markus Söder and Alexander Dobrindt at the last Seeon conference in 2019. © Ernst Wukits/Imago
The CSU pulls back into the snow.
For the first time since the corona pandemic, the CSU is planning a January retreat in the Seeon monastery in Upper Bavaria.
Berlin/Seeon – From January 6th to 8th, the members of the Bundestag will meet in Seeon, the focus will be on international politics and energy issues.
According to information from the
Munich Merkur
, some guests will be there again.
CSU retreat with Metsola, Masala and Rhine
Appearances by EU Parliament President Roberta Metsola (not unexciting after the great Qatar affair of Parliament) and the Prime Minister of the Republic of Moldova, Natalia Gavrilita - a neighboring country of war-torn Ukraine - are therefore planned.
In addition, there are security experts Carlo Masala (Bundeswehr University) and Peter R. Neumann (King's College London, 2021 as advisor to Armin Laschet's campaign staff) and economics professor Lars Feld.
CSU leader Markus Söder and the new Hessian Prime Minister Boris Rhein (CDU) are coming from domestic politics;
in Hesse as in Bavaria there will be elections in autumn 2023.
We are starting into a year "that will be largely shaped by the security and energy policy situation in Germany and Europe," said Alexander Dobrindt, head of the regional group, to
Merkur
.
"The traffic light has not yet allowed the necessary actions to follow the turning point," criticizes the CSU politician.
Instead, after a year, the traffic light balance sheet was an "economically weakened and increasingly isolated" country.
"In 2023, the traffic light must organize the turning point more and no longer waste time."
Alexander Dobrindt also wants to use the Seeon retreat to criticize the traffic light: "The traffic light has so far not followed through with the necessary actions." © Bernd von Jutrczenka/dpa
Seeon: The new retreat for the members of the Bundestag
The January 2022 exam was moved to Berlin and then pushed back to February due to the high number of corona cases.
Among other things, Dobrindt had caught it himself at the time.
In 2021, too, the traditional snow pictures from Upper Bavaria were dispensed with and the meeting was held in Berlin under sometimes very strict Corona conditions, each with a focus on business and finance;
2021 still with the advantage of being a governing party.
Now there should be the classic exam framework again;
After the departure of the CSU from Kreuth, Seeon had become the new retreat for the members of the Bundestag.
Whereby retreat does not necessarily mean seclusion: Usually, a retinue of dozens of journalists travels from the capital after the almost four dozen MPs who want to dominate the headlines in the news-poor time around the turn of the year.
The conferences themselves are internal, but are always flanked by a number of press appearances by politicians, mostly outside, despite the bitter cold.
The state group retreat is the first of several conferences of parties and parliamentary groups, mostly from Bavaria.
The CSU parliamentary group, which meets from January 16 to 19 in the Franconian Banz monastery, has NRW Prime Minister Hendrik Wüst (CDU) as a guest.
The SPD meets in Munich.
However, Seeon is not limited to the Christian Socials.
Another retreat is currently being planned there: Bavaria's FDP faction is also moving to the monastery near Lake Chiemsee.
Here on January 12th and 13th the strategy for the election year will be discussed.
External guest at the Liberals is Federal Transport Minister Volker Wissing (FDP).
