cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/51446344

Next Sunday, September 6th, state elections will be held in Saxony-Anhalt. All eyes are on one party in particular: the AfD. Not only could it become the largest party with 42% of the vote, but due to Germany’s electoral system, it might even be able to govern alone. The other parties will probably get about as many votes together as the AfD alone. Security services in the state classify the AfD as extreme-right. And the party plans to implement its ideology in schools, since education is a state responsibility. They intend to make significant changes there. They want to make it to make it less "woke" and more patriotic. For example,

• the party wants separate schools for disabled children and refugees.
• In history, less attention to the Holocaust and more to Bismarck.
• politics banned from classrooms.
• No rainbow flag, but the national flag in the schoolyard.
• No more anti-racism programs.
• And Russian becomes a compulsory subject.

If they end up governing, you also have to realize that they can adjust the education system for all pupils in that state in a way that suits their agenda, and that they can use it very effectively to position themselves.

The AfD's lead candidate surrounds himself with figures from a banned neo-Nazi youth organization and Identitarian movement. Party officials have been seen attending Putin's birthday at the Russian embassy in Berlin. If they win, they gain access to classified German security documents. If they govern in that state, they immediately get access to all documents from the German security services. And that is causing enormous concern for the German government. Because that way, Russia gets to look along via the AfD into all kinds of documents that you really don't want Russia to have sight of.

Germany is also afraid that AfD will use this as a pilot project on a small scale to see what scores well and use that nationally. Combined with the fact that they are already the largest party in the polls, and a chancellor who is becoming less popular by the day... Germany is extremely worried about this.