media
Mobbing CDU politician: SWR has to cancel the live switch from the party conference
Journalist Natalie Akbari: Thomas Hornung kept talking to her
© Screenshot / SWR / ARD
Going live from a district party conference is usually not the most spectacular TV moment of the day. But at the CDU in Mannheim, tempers are heated because of the mask affair of the former chairman. So much so that an interview had to be broken off due to ongoing disruptions.
Going live from party meetings is a routine job for TV policy reporters. To capture the mood a little, have a few talks with local politicians. As a rule, professionals meet professionals here. Escalations are rarely to be expected there. However, the SWR had to cancel a switch from the district party conference of the CDU Mannheim.
The termination is easy to understand. The journalist concerned Natalie Akbari actually wanted to moderate and lead a conversation when she was harassed and molested from the side. The troublemaker, CDU politician Thomas Hornung, complained from the side about “dubious journalism” and called the switch “an insolence”. Again and again Akbari tried to start anyway, but was interrupted by Hornung. At some point she gave up – and declared that she would end the switch.
Hot trench warfare
The current situation in the district association is likely to be to blame. The mood was “heated up”, said Akbari in a later program on “SWR Aktuell”. The district association is divided: After the district’s former member of the Bundestag, Nikolas Löbel, had to resign because of his so-called mask affair and even left the party, the association is fighting about how to deal with the situation. The board of directors is accused of inadequate efforts to clear up the events, some even speak of a cover-up.
Akbari said in a later conversation that she actually wanted to report in a balanced manner. The disturbance occurred when she had just interviewed a critic of Löbel and now wanted to present the position of the board. “At that moment, Thomas Hornung spoke to me from the side,” she reports. Hornung, who used to work as Löbel’s office manager, apparently found the circuit disruptive because it took place while a speech was being given on the stage, according to Akbari. “A very, very uncomfortable situation, I was no longer able to report in a balanced manner.” In addition, insulting statements would have been made after the end of the Homburg switch.
Incidentally, Akbari does not reproach the CDU district association itself. “But I would like to say that a large part of the CDU members here in Mannheim came to me afterwards to tell me that they didn’t think that was okay either,” she said. Hornung, who himself claims to be a trained journalist, has not yet commented on the incident.
Source: SWR