Non-partisan, but in line: what to expect from Pirna's new mayor Tim Lochner

AfD success in Saxony - Non-partisan, but in line: what to expect from Pirna's new mayor Tim Lochner

It is an important propaganda success for the AfD: Tim Lochner is the first time that the far-right party has won a local election in Germany. 38.5 percent of voters in Pirna, Saxony, voted for the 53-year-old as their new mayor on Sunday. Lochner is not a member of the party, whose state association is considered by Saxony's Office for the Protection of the Constitution to be right-wing extremist. However, the local politician clearly does not want to distance himself from the ideology of his fellow campaigners.

"If we have a proportion of foreigners in certain parts of the city that is demonstrably 38% in elementary school and daycare centers, then for me that is already an exchange of the native population," Lochner told MDR after the election, repeating a statement from his election campaign. The myth of "population exchange" is one of the most powerful conspiracy narratives in the far-right spectrum. When asked about this, Lochner, a master carpenter, replied that he had made the statement as a private individual.

Lochner wants to test city employees in Pirna for loyalty

However, Lochner's comments also raised eyebrows among his democratic rivals in the town of 40,000 inhabitants: "I will try to get to know the employees in the town hall individually if possible - and test them for loyalty," MDR quoted the future head of administration as saying. Lochner left open what exactly he meant by this. In any case, Lochner told the news agency DPA that it should be checked whether the increase in staff in recent years has made the administration "more citizen-oriented".

More than 250 people currently work in Pirna's municipal administration. As the full-time mayor, who is elected for seven years in Saxony, Lochner will be their superior in future. This means that he can issue instructions and enforce their implementation with disciplinary measures - or punish non-compliance. Of course, even a head of administration cannot simply dismiss disagreeable employees without further ado.

Saxony's Greens react with concern to the election in Pirna

It is unclear what influence the far-right ideology of the AfD will have on political events in Pirna in the future. Even though Tim Lochner appears to share the party's main beliefs, he has not yet attracted attention as a hardliner. Lochner was a member of the CDU until 2016, but has so far refused to join the AfD: "I was previously a member of the CDU, but I gave back my party membership. Now I no longer want to be a party member," he is quoted as saying by Die Welt. Lochner has been a member of Pirna town council for many years. In the 2017 election, he was clearly defeated by the then non-party incumbent Klaus-Peter Hanke.

Representatives of other parties expressed concern about Lochner's election victory. "We are dismayed by the election of a mayor from a party that the Office for the Protection of the Constitution classified as far-right last week," wrote the Saxon state association of the Greens on X (formerly Twitter). "We must now do everything we can to strengthen our coexistence and restore confidence in our democracy."

Why China's Communist Party should be happy about Lochner's election victory

Last week, Saxony's Office for the Protection of the Constitution classified the AfD in the state as a confirmed right-wing extremist party. After Thuringia and Saxony-Anhalt, the Saxon AfD is already the third state association with such a classification. This means that the Office for the Protection of the Constitution can use intelligence services to gather information about extremist activities of the state association.

The Chinese Communist Party should be delighted with Lochner's election victory. According to research by the news portal t-online, Lochner maintains close ties with Maximilian Krah, an AfD MEP and member of the AfD's national executive committee. Lochner travelled to China together with Krah in November 2019, where a party organization awarded him the title of "Ambassador of International Friendship of Lishui". A city partnership between Pirna and Lishiu, a city with a population of 2.5 million, was also discussed.

After the trip in 2019, Lochner complained about resistance in Pirna's city administration to cooperation with China, according to t-online. Should he become mayor, he wants to resume these plans. However, his proximity to Maximilian Krah could still become a problem for Lochner: The Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution classifies Krah's statements as nationalistic and anti-constitutional. Krah, who admires China, is also controversial within the party: His book "Politics from the Right: a Manifesto" is clearly "anti-conservative, anti-bourgeois and anti-Western" wrote AfD member of parliament Norbert Kleinwächter in a review of the book.

Source: MDR/ t-online/ welt.de