BERLIN — The far-right leader of Thuringia’s AfD party, Björn Höcke, hinted at what plans he had for the German state if he were to govern. The education system would need to be “freed from ideology projects” such as “inclusion,” the former teacher said in an interview Wednesday on TV channel MDR.
The current German school model allows students with disabilities to be taught with other students to enable equal participation in society. This was enshrined in law in 2009 with the ratification of the U.N. Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.
German politicians and disability campaigners reacted with shock when asked about Höcke’s comments by POLITICO.
The statements made by Höcke would give a “blatant and unvarnished view of his world of thought,” argued Wilfried Oellers, representative for people with disabilities of the Bundestag’s parliamentary group of the center-right Christian Democratic Union party.
Corinna Rüffer, the Green Party’s representative for people with disabilities, says she was not surprised by Höcke’s remarks: “The AfD views disabilities as a disease. Excluding people with disabilities from schools leads to exclusion from society.”
Jürgen Dusel, the federal government’s Commissioner for Persons with Disabilities, points out that Germany has a special responsibility because of the systematic mass murder of disabled people by the Nazis. “That’s why it’s important for me to make clear that inclusion is not about an ideology project, but about the implementation of fundamental basic rights, human dignity, the development of personality and equality before the law.”
“I myself first went to a special school and then to a regular school. This change was a blessing for me personally,” explained Dusel, who is severely visually impaired. “Inclusion is by no means a burden for students without disabilities, either, but rather an enrichment, as they thus come into contact with people with disabilities early in their lives and don’t develop prejudices in the first place.”
Höcke did not respond to a request for comment from POLITICO.
Current polls see the AfD as by far the strongest force in Thuringia with 34 percent approval. Opposition politician Höcke stated in the interview he would like to become the state’s head of government after the next election in the fall of 2024.
However, that seems unlikely, as no other party in the state’s parliament cooperates with the AfD. Thuringia’s AfD has been monitored since 2021 by the state’s domestic intelligence service and is classified as certain to be right-wing extremist.