Berlin’s energy senator says fear of right-wing parties must not slow down coal exit

Fears of a surge in support for the right-wing populist party AfD must not influence the speed of Germany’s coal exit, Berlin’s Green energy senator Ramona Pop says in a reply to Brandenburg’s state premier Dietmar Woidke, published in the Tagesspiegel. SPD politician Woidke had said a quick end to coal-fired power production could result in rising support for the AfD especially in the eastern German coal region of Lusatia, which partly lies in Brandenburg, but Pop says this argument is “factually wrong and also dishonest.” She argues that structural economic problems in coal regions have been building up for years and postponing the end of coal would only worsen the situation. “Pointing at the rise of right-wing populists is just an attempt to discredit necessary modernisation policies,” Pop says, adding that Brandenburg’s government merely tried to divert attention from the fact that it has done little to manage the economic transition in the region. “The right-wing populists’ alleged recipe for success is to not even try to find answers to difficult questions,” but rather to shift every objective debate to an emotional level. “A state premier must not play along with this strategy,” she says.

Read the opinion piece in German here.

See the CLEW factsheet Germany’s three lignite mining regions for background.