2024-08-30 07:00:27
CDU leader Merz has sparked a debate with his proposed solutions to the issue of migration. Vice Chancellor Habeck of the Greens is firmly opposed to this.
Vice Chancellor Robert Habeck has once again sharply rejected CDU leader Friedrich Merz’s push for a “national emergency”. “This is not a solution to the problem, it is irresponsible,” said the Green politician at a campaign event of the Saxon Greens in Leipzig.
Merz had suggested declaring a “national emergency” in order to circumvent EU law and to be able to turn back migrants who had first entered another EU country. Habeck pointed out that this would lead to major disruptions in the EU and spoke of a “wrong proposal”.
Habeck continued: “Now I don’t know whether it’s ignorance or perhaps a lack of European or government experience or whether it’s an attempt to just throw one out there for the sake of throwing one out there.” The effect is the same, there is an unredeemable demand in the air. “If you want to solve problems, you have to consider the means of solving the problem beforehand and not just create expectations that then lead to the next disappointment.”
Regarding the economic situation in eastern Germany, Habeck said that it had benefited from investments that were also supported by the state. Habeck praised his party colleagues in the state who were working hard. “And I am doing the same. And you can now see the results of three years of work in the growth figures for the east.”
Habeck described the state election in Saxony on Sunday as crucial. “If this goes wrong, the discourse will continue to turn towards hate (…). If we manage to get back into government with the votes for Alliance 90/The Greens, then history will be written differently.”
Habeck also outlined his hope for a change in mood in Germany by the time of the next federal election, which is scheduled to take place in September 2025. “At the moment everything is exhausting, difficult, tense to the breaking point. Populism has an easy time of it. A lot of people are tired and are withdrawing.” However, there is “a great improbability” that the situation in September next year will be the same as it is this month.
This hoped-for turnaround, or so the thinking goes, would suit the Greens. Habeck firmly believes that the majority wants to live in a country “where a perspective is created, where the person who puts down the others the most is not politically rewarded.” Habeck explained: “We don’t want to live like that. And there just has to be some crystallization point where we prove to ourselves that we are much, much better in Germany than the mood and the polls are currently showing. If that happens, then anything can happen.”
The stability of Chancellor Angela Merkel’s (CDU) reign has been lost, and that is what we must now accept, said Habeck. “One year ago, no one believed that the Wall would fall. Things happen when people let them happen. And we are human. There is no law of nature that says we have to be in a bad mood, sullen and full of hate. We decide that ourselves. It is in our own hands. And if we take matters into our own hands and decide differently, then a lot is possible in Germany.”