A right-wing blogger conducts interviews in the North Rhine-Westphalia state parliament - with Hans-Georg Maaßen and an AfD member of parliament. A violation of the law for State Parliament President Kuper.
Düsseldorf - The North Rhine-Westphalian state parliament president André Kuper (CDU) has accused the AfD state parliamentary group in North Rhine-Westphalia of violating the right to use the parliamentary group hall in the state parliament. Peter Weber, a right-wing blogger, conducted an interview for his platform with the leader of the AfD in North Rhine-Westphalia, Martin Vincentz, and the former president of the Office for the Protection of the Constitution, Hans-Georg Maaßen (Union of Values). For Kuper, this represents an “abuse of the right to use” the parliamentary group hall.
With his “Hello Opinion” portal, founded in 2019, Weber, a building contractor near Nuremberg, says he wants to enable an exchange of opinions. The portal sees itself as an impartial mouthpiece for people who feel like they are being ignored by the current political landscape.
In fact, however, it is close to the right-wing spectrum; Weber likes to talk about the “dictatorship of this left-wing politics” and “media censorship” and is often hostile to migrants. This was reported by the newspaper
Nordbayern
. In July 2020, “Hello Opinion” was stripped of its non-profit status after the publication was found to be close to right-wing extremism.
Kuper calls on the AfD to ensure that the video is deleted
For his latest video, which was published on Wednesday (April 17) on the “Hello Opinion” YouTube channel, Weber conducted an interview with Maaßen and Vincentz. The AfD parliamentary group in North Rhine-Westphalia made its parliamentary group hall available for this purpose. The President of the State Parliament sees this as a violation of the law by the AfD. In a letter to Vincentz, Kuper asked the AfD to ensure that the video was deleted.
A spokesman for the state parliament expressed to the
dpa
news agency the suspicion of possible “abuse of the right of use” of the parliamentary group hall. Due to this situation, Kuper warned the AfD parliamentary group in writing. A copy of the letter was also sent to the State Audit Office. This is a common step in such cases to give the Court of Auditors the opportunity to audit.
State Parliament President Kuper wants the video deleted - to comply with the “legal requirements in the future”.
Kuper reminded the AfD in his letter that the parliamentary group hall may only be used for internal purposes. In addition, the parliamentary group must be clearly identified as the author in public relations work. The President of the State Parliament asked the parliamentary group to “comply with the legal requirements in the future” and to “work for Weber to delete the video”. As of Thursday morning, the recording in question is still online.
In accordance with Article 39 Paragraph 2 of the Constitution of North Rhine-Westphalia, the State Parliament President Kuper has issued house rules for the State Parliament, which regulate the house rules in Section 2. This generally lies with the President of the State Parliament. However, for the relevant parliamentary group rooms in the Maaßen case, paragraph 3 provides that, in addition to the president, housekeeping rights are also transferred to the parliamentary groups. Nevertheless, the president retains house authority here too if an “abuse of the right of use” is determined. This is what the online magazine
Legal Tribune Online
writes .
Weber has already made several videos in the state parliament - AfD may take legal action
In response to a dpa
inquiry about the letter from the state parliament president, a spokesman for the AfD parliamentary group said
that the case would be examined legally. The party has given the letter to a Cologne law firm in order to possibly take legal action, as
WDR
reports.
Weber, who is considered a supporter of Vincentz, has already published several interviews with the AfD parliamentary group leader conducted in the state parliament, the broadcaster continued. So far, however, the state parliament has not objected to this; However, this does not apply to Weber's latest video. However, such interviews are normal business in the state parliament - even if they are conducted by alternative media professionals from the new right spectrum.
(tpn)