As of: March 15, 2024, 5:45 p.m
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The lettering "Rathaus" can be read on the old town hall of the city of Schwerin.
© Jens Büttner/dpa
The city of Schwerin did not want Götz Kubitschek from the New Right to appear in its town hall.
However, in the legal dispute over the validity of the rental agreement, she lost to the organizer.
Schwerin - The publisher Götz Kubitschek, who is one of the most influential actors of the so-called New Right, is allowed to appear on Saturday in the old town hall of Schwerin at the invitation of the AfD youth organization Junge Alternative.
On Friday evening, the 2nd Senate of the Higher Administrative Court (OVG) in Greifswald confirmed the decision of the Schwerin Administrative Court, which had upheld the organizer's objection to the city's termination of the rental agreement for the meeting room.
Schwerin lodged a complaint against this with the next higher authority, but was ultimately unsuccessful.
“The reasons for the appeal presented do not justify changing the contested decision,” said the OVG in its justification.
Without a legal basis, the city administration is prevented from using expected statements that go beyond criminal content when denying the right to participate in public facilities.
It was not sufficiently explained that there was a reasonable probability that legal violations would occur at the event, for example in the form of speech-related offenses.
In the first instance, the city's judges had given up their duty as public institutions to observe basic rights such as the right to freedom of expression and to guarantee equal treatment when dedicating municipal facilities.
The city administration had terminated the rental agreement concluded for Saturday evening because it felt betrayed by the applicant because he had not named the guest speaker.
“By inviting a well-known right-wing extremist speaker, the Junge Alternative has crossed a line,” explained Mayor Rico Badenschier (SPD).
He does not see the justification put forward by the court that the state capital has previously created and approved the use of a public institution as a forum for opinion formation and is now not allowed to restrict it under the principles of equal treatment.
The event announced by Junge Alternative is not comparable to the events that usually take place in the Demmlersaal and should not be put on the same level.
“In this respect, the court cannot complain about any unequal treatment,” Badenschier argued.
The Schwerin Administrative Court had ordered the state capital to allow Junge Alternative, as an applicant, to use the Demmler Hall in accordance with the contract concluded at the beginning of March.
The hall, in which city representatives also meet regularly, is a de facto public facility and is also used by the city for political lectures and training events.
The Junge Alternative could rely on this award in accordance with the requirement of equal treatment of “essentially the same circumstances by public authorities,” it said in the statement.
The Junge Alternative MV also held events there last year.
The Demmler Hall should therefore be assessed as a public facility that is made available to the largely unlimited public for communicative, including political, exchange.
Preventing an event in the room that had already been agreed upon but is no longer desired for newly discovered reasons is not permitted.
Regardless of the constitutional protection authority's classification as documented by the city, it is not apparent that there is a risk of violating criminal regulations or committing administrative offenses as a result of the speaking activity.
Kubitschek is co-founder of the “Institute for State Policy” (IfS) in Saxony-Anhalt, which the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution has classified as a “secure right-wing extremist effort” and which, from the point of view of the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution, occupies a strategically important role in the “New Right” network.
At the beginning of March, the Junge Alternative had already reported in online media about Kubitschek's lecture on March 16th in Schwerin, without, however, mentioning the exact location.
The Junge Alternative has been observed by the Office for the Protection of the Constitution for almost a year as a confirmed right-wing extremist effort.
dpa