When the first forecasts come out at 6 p.m., Markus Walbrunn is standing in a small park on the Würm, near his polling station in Obermenzing. A television crew wanted to take pictures of him here. It is said that his party, the AfD, achieved around 15 percent across Bavaria in this state election. “Definitely positive,” Walbrunn calls this trend. Such a result “would also be good for my own election chances.” In the city, however, the party only achieved 7.7 percent, an increase of 1.2 points (as of 9:25 p.m.).
In fact, it is now very likely that Walbrunn, previously a city councilor, will soon become a member of the state parliament. Because the 36-year-old is in third place on his party’s Upper Bavaria list, his constituency was Pasing. In the last legislative period, six AfD members from Upper Bavaria came to the state parliament, with a result that is now becoming apparent, there could be a good eight, Walbrunn calculates. Maybe even more. And so a second Munich resident can also hope to make it into the state parliament: Andreas Reuter from the Moosach district, ninth place on the list.
However, it is unlikely that the only Munich MP who has previously represented the AfD in the state parliament will make it again. Because Uli Henkel from the Giesing district only made it to 21st place on the list. It is a very special constellation. Because both Walbrunn and Reuter were employees in Henkel’s parliamentary office. A lot would have to happen for Henkel to make a giant leap forward with an exorbitant second vote result. His political career will “probably come to an end,” says Henkel, 69. It would then have been ended by his own (former) people.
Does Henkel feel betrayed? “They just threw their hat into the ring,” says Henkel, and at the assembly meeting the young candidates also brought their own people with them, thus initiating a potential generational change in the AfD faction. “But,” Henkel then admits, “it hurts when you see that five years of work isn’t rewarded.”
Markus Walbrunn says he stopped working for Henkel in the state parliament in January of this year “because then they were in competition with each other.” He has now gone from Park an der Würm to his polling station, the elementary school on Oselstrasse. He wants to observe the counting of votes there and “exercise my democratic rights.” Doubts as to whether everything is going well in Germany’s political system are often heard in the AfD.
Walbrunn, a political scientist and a party member since 2015, emphasizes that he “does not believe in systematic election fraud.” After watching the election workers unfold and sort papers for three quarters of an hour, he said everything made a good impression. He won’t stay until the end, but will follow the progress of election evening from home. And then, he hopes, he will find out on Monday whether he will be a member of the state parliament in the future.