Dissatisfaction is growing in the municipalities. The Free Voters in Saxony want to benefit from this between the CDU and AfD – with Grimma’s popular mayor Matthias Berger. He is also polarizing in his city.
Matthias Berger likes it drastic. The fact that he is running for the Saxon state parliament is nothing less than an “act of local self-defense” – against chronic underfunding and against bureaucracy. “We are afraid that we will inevitably be driven into the wall,” says the mayor of Grimma.
“We” are five mayors who want to enter the state parliament in the September election. They were put together by the Free Voters. The independent Berger is yours Top candidate.
Parties as a discontinued model
Berger, born in 1968, took over the Grimma town hall in 2001. Two severe flooding – 2002 and 2013 – made him known nationwide as a disaster manager. As the “maker of Grimma” (Leipziger Volkszeitung), he mastered the reconstruction. In his three re-elections he received 98, 90 and 86 percent of the vote.
The fact that he is no longer in Grimma is fitting for the times: with the Corona and asylum debates, the local level gained in importance. District administrators and mayors are part of the inventory of political talk shows. There they explain how the decisions from Berlin and Dresden are implemented locally – it’s often just a matter of how, not if.
Berger’s demands include free daycare centers, free school meals and tax relief for young families. But he also asks fundamental questions: Berger wants direct democracy based on the Swiss model. With “party democracy,” which would primarily reward long-term party membership, “that won’t work anymore,” he says.
Berger wants to abolish funding as much as possible. These only served “to exert political influence” on the part of the federal and state governments. According to Berger, around 30 applications for funding from the city were recently rejected. He is now suing in the case of a ventilation system for a primary school.
Radical courting of conservatives
Berger formulates fundamental principles radically. “The state is degenerating,” he says. The funding system is “sick”. Berger uses the word often. The Greens are “the worst polarizers in society” and there is no need for democracy promotion programs. He has also called politicians from other parties “political zombies.” Where is the difference to the AfD?
The AfD is not in the middle, says Berger. Their demands, such as nuclear power plants in Saxony, cannot be taken seriously. Nevertheless, Berger and the State Association of Free Voters do not want to adhere to their party’s ban on cooperation with the AfD. In other words: If in doubt, Berger would also vote for an AfD proposal in the state parliament.
In general, the accusation of “being right-wing” is used to “stall” any debate about change. That’s what Berger said at a farmers’ demonstration in January. He repeatedly points to people’s declining trust in parties, the state and federal government and also the media. Without offers like the Free Voters, what he sees as the conservative majority of the Saxon population is in danger of being crushed between extremist poles.
Free voters still want to participate in government
In the state elections five years ago – the Free Voters got 3.4 percent back then – Berger did not run himself. The fact that things are different today is thanks to Thomas Weidinger. The business lawyer has led the regional association for three years.
The Free Voters can only come to the state parliament with their local leaders, says Weidinger. He therefore claims to have spoken to around 60 non-party mayors. Berger was at the top of the list. It is “communal, citizen-oriented, fact-oriented” and speaks the language of the people, says Weidinger. But he doesn’t want to adopt Berger’s formulations.
Weidinger thinks ten percent is possible this time. The declared goal is not opposition, but rather: a “bourgeois government” of the CDU and Free Voters – this could also “break down” the AfD, according to Weidinger.
Can Grimma do without Berger?
A direct mandate for Berger is almost firmly planned. But do the people of Grimma want to let their mayor go? Some people told him he couldn’t do that, says Berger. But there was no other way. In addition, there are probably some “in the left-green milieu” of the city “who have a unique chance to get rid of me.”
By this he means, among others, Kerstin Köditz. For the Grimma state parliament member of the Left Party, Berger is a “right-wing populist”. However, she would rather keep him in Grimma “to save Saxony,” jokes Köditz.
She herself is not running again, but wants to join the city council in June with an alliance: “Grimma shows edge” is likely to be the first list in Germany on which a politician from the left runs alongside one from the FDP. The top candidate is 19-year-old Jonas Siegert, a liberal. There is also a Green Party member and several non-party members.
Behind this is an alliance of the same name, which, according to Köditz and Siegert, was founded in 2022 in response to racist incidents and extreme right-wing Corona demos in Grimma. Since then, “Grimma Shows Edge” has been organizing counter-protests and an annual democracy festival in the city.
Several hundred people came to a demonstration against right-wing extremism at the beginning of February. Mayor Berger only stopped by briefly. He was not invited to speak.
“Grimma shows edge” with the left and the FDP
The fact that “Grimma shows edge” is now running for the city council is partly due to parties like the AfD and the Free Saxony, and partly to Berger, says Köditz. “You’re either on his side – or against him,” is how she describes the mood in the city.
Siegert says that Berger created many dependencies as mayor. “The political culture in Grimma therefore hardly allows any other opinions.” A “youth forum” founded by Siegert lost the support of Berger and the city after they began to criticize it.
Similar to Berger in the state parliament, Siegert and Köditz want to achieve more participation and democracy in Grimma. Alliances like hers would act as contacts for people who are afraid of a shift to the right, says Köditz. And here, when it comes to campaigning for democracy, the party membership shouldn’t play a role, says FDP man Siegert: “It’s about local politics and not about the end of combustion engines.”
“Grimma shows edge” is hoping for a double-digit result in the city council election. Parties there are already having a hard time: 17 of the 26 city councilors come from voters’ associations – also thanks to the support of Matthias Berger.