In 2013 he was one of the founders of the AfD-Kreisverband München-Land, was a founding member of the AfD-Mittelstandsforum as well as a direct candidate in the 2013 federal election and the 2018 Bavarian state election in the Munich district. Now Ulrich Riediger from Grünwald is leaving the party. “I’m not leaving the AfD out of annoyance or resignation, but because I personally no longer see any point in my membership in a political association that has been crushed by all sides for years,” he explains. “With my volunteer work in the early days of the AfD, I did more damage to myself personally, professionally and privately than I was able to help the AfD to strengthen the democratic constitutional state in our country,” he concluded.
According to Riediger, the greatest organizational success of the AfD is undoubtedly that it is represented in all parliaments today. But their reputation is ruined. Riediger sees one reason in the “stigmatization of the party through political competition”, but also “in the sometimes clumsy rhetoric of their own protagonists”. One should distance oneself from “rhetorical rioters”. The party’s result in the most recent federal election eight years after it was founded was disappointing and that, according to Riediger, “despite the political escalation in the country” https://www.sueddeutsche.de/muenchen/landkreismuenchen/. “Ten percent is easy little to influence. “
In 2013 he was still optimistic. He was impressed by “the combined academic competence of the founders”. There were economics professors, constitutional lawyers and lawyers. The momentum from the early days has now fizzled out. “In the past eight years, since it was founded, the AfD has stirred up a lot of dust as an opposition and worn out committed founding members, but unfortunately it has achieved little politically so far,” said Riediger’s conclusion.