Watch the video: Cheering in Nordhausen after AfD defeat: “We are not Sonneberg!”
Cheers from Kai Buchmann’s supporters on Sunday evening in Nordhausen. The mayor of the Thuringian city defended his office in the runoff election. With a lead of around ten percentage points, the independent local politician left his competitor from the AfD, Jörg Prophet, behind. Buchmann: “Yes, I think I’m happy for Nordhausen that we appear in the press again today, then again not and lead a normal life here in Nordhausen.”
Reaction from voters (WOMAN (WITHOUT NAME): “And we are overjoyed that the AfD has screwed up here.” MAN (WITHOUT NAME): “Sign that it will stand for democracy, for diversity. (WOMAN): ” Exactly. (MAN): “We are not brown, we are not Sonneberg, we are Nordhausen.”
In the first round of voting two weeks ago, Prophet was well ahead of his competitor with 42 percent of the vote. Regarding his defeat on Sunday, he said: “According to the reactions that I had on the street at all the information stands and at the events, we were actually given the subjective perception that we might already have a majority. That’s not the case “This is the case. But this is not a loss for us in that sense, but rather an incentive for me personally to tackle the next tasks and, above all, to work out the issues we have more clearly.” Prophet offered his competitor a chance to work on the city council. The AfD candidate doesn’t believe in a so-called “firewall” against his party, which is classified as right-wing extremist by the Thuringian Office for the Protection of the Constitution. “Oh, you know, firewalls, those are the terms used by people who have no idea about local politics. We had various committees last week, next week we have district council, city council. I already mentioned it, we work together constantly .”
With a victory, Prophet would have become Germany’s first AfD mayor. In Sonneberg, Thuringia, the first AfD district administrator, Robert Sesselmann, was elected at the end of June, and state elections are due in Thuringia in 2024. In current polls, the AfD is ahead of Prime Minister Bodo Ramelow’s Die Linke party, which currently governs with an alliance of the SPD and the Greens.