As of: January 19, 2024, 8:29 a.m
By: Ulrike Hagen
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Entrepreneurs increasingly see the rise of the AfD as a damage to Germany's reputation, which endangers the location and prosperity of everyone.
Frankfurt - Last week it became known that plans to deport millions of people were apparently made at a conspiratorial meeting between some, some high-ranking, AfD members and right-wing extremists in a country hotel near Potsdam at the end of November.
For a long time, entrepreneurs remained silent about the AfD's record survey results.
But now prominent voices from business are speaking out, warning sharply about the damage to Germany caused by the rise of the AfD - including the President of the Bundesbank, the CEOs of Infineon and Roland Berger, as well as Bavaria's most important business association.
Entrepreneurs increasingly see the rise of the AfD as a damage to Germany's reputation, which endangers the location and prosperity of everyone.
Here: Bertram Brossardt, vbw (left), Jochen Hanebeck, CEO Infineon (right).
© Montage: IMAGO / Sven Simon (2)
Business bosses warn: AfD as a risk – “endangers the economic future of our country”
After crossing the red line in Potsdam, a jolt seems to be going through Germany's executive suites.
Stefan Schaible, head of the management consultancy Roland Berger, told
IPPEN.MEDIA
's
fr.de
on Thursday (January 18): “The idea of remigration is disturbing and undermines the foundations of our democratic constitutional state.
It also endangers the economic future of our country.”
Germany is facing a huge demographic challenge.
“In order to master them and maintain prosperity, we need immigration – and who wants to live in a country where he or she is not wanted?”
A clear statement about the Potsdam meeting of AfD politicians and right-wing extremists.
Bavarian business lobby: AfD “opponent of the international economic model on which prosperity is based”
It is clear that the strategy of sneaking into power as a wolf in sheep's clothing no longer works.
Completely independent of the political stripe - whether Christian-conservative or from the Green environment - and the current economic forecasts, which are anything but rosy, more and more entrepreneurs agree that what the AfD is planning to do would make things even worse.
In terms of economic policy, the AfD threatens to relapse into nation-state thinking, propaganda against the EU and the euro, but in favor of Russia.
All of this causes massive damage to companies and to Bavaria and Germany as a whole.
Bertram Brossardt, Managing Director of the Bavarian Business Association
“As a business association, we do not sit down at the table with anyone who propagates right-wing slogans and is observed by the Office for the Protection of the Constitution.
The party is undemocratic and anti-European,” said Bertram Brossardt, general manager of the CSU-affiliated Bavarian Business Association (vbw)
to
fr.de.
“In reality, it is an opponent of our international economic model, on which our prosperity is based.”
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“This is massively damaging to Germany as a business location”: business associations warn
Brossardt adds: “We as an association also want to make it clear what the AfD threatens in terms of economic policy: a relapse into nation-state thinking, propaganda against the EU and the euro, but pro-Russia.
All of this is massively damaging to companies and to Bavaria and Germany as a whole.” The more the AfD poisons the social climate, the less attractive Germany becomes for attracting skilled workers from abroad, “which we urgently need to solve the shortage of skilled workers.”
As CEO, I consider economic and social policies aimed at isolation to be harmful and a threat to prosperity for all of us.
Jochen Hanebeck, CEO Infenion Technologies
Without specifically naming a specific party, the CEO of the Munich-based Infineon group, Jochen Hanebeck, also explained on Wednesday (January 17) on the LinkedIn career network: “As CEO, I believe that economic and social policies aimed at isolation are harmful and harmful for all of us endangering prosperity.”
The basic values of peaceful coexistence are non-negotiable: “Hate and exclusion must have no place in our society.
The idea of so-called remigration is inhumane.”
“What’s going on in Germany?”: Entrepreneurs increasingly see the rise of the AfD as a locational risk
Bundesbank President Joachim Nagel expresses great concern about the rise of right-wing populist forces, as he
explains in
Spiegel .
It is positive that many people are now taking to the streets against this development.
He emphasized: “I will also take part in this.” He is currently being asked concerned about the situation in Germany from abroad: “I am being asked: What is going on in Germany?”
Nagel underlines the importance of a tolerant and open Germany for the economy and urgently needed investments: “We are an aging society that needs qualified immigrants.
And to do that, these people also have to enjoy living in Germany.”
It is clear to entrepreneurs what the AfD's policies would mean for the economy.
The question is whether the message also reaches voters.
The AfD is still stable at over 20 percent in opinion polls nationwide.
In Saxony, Thuringia and Brandenburg, where new state parliaments will be elected in September, it is even over 30 percent.