DAt a party conference in Augsburg, CSU chairman Markus Söder accused Chancellor Olaf Scholz of being “extremely snooty” and “arrogant”, not least towards neighboring countries. “Olaf Scholz is duping the whole European Union,” said Söder, with a view to non-agreements on relief packages.
Pride comes before the fall, he advises Scholz “urgently to more cooperation”. Söder also criticized the participation of the Chinese shipping company Cosco in the port of Hamburg, which Scholz had pushed through against resistance from cabinet colleagues. In view of the experiences with Russia, that was “the wrong signal,” said Söder.
Scholz’ party friend, Federal Minister of Health Karl Lauterbach, criticized Söder for his corona and drug policies. “It is irresponsible to warn about Corona and to allow smoking.” Söder emphasized: “I don’t want any drugs in Bavaria”, after previously vowing that it was right to let the Oktoberfest take place this year.
Söder also rode hard attacks against the Greens. They are “not competent in times of crisis”, a “nice fair-weather party”. Their resistance to an extension of the service life of the three nuclear power plants remaining on the grid shows that they are not at all concerned with climate protection. Rather, they are still the old left-wing anti-nuclear party in which “Claudia Roth cries and Trittin screams”. It is thanks to the “massive pressure” from the CSU that the traffic light made important decisions.
CSU demands expansion of renewables
As an example, Söder named the filling of the gas storage facilities in the south or the extension of the term, which the CSU, however, is not long enough. The leading motion for the party congress states: “The future belongs to renewable energies. However, Germany’s response to the abrupt disappearance of the pipeline gas technology bridge cannot consist of tearing down the still existing nuclear energy bridge at the same time.”
The traffic light’s decision to only allow the nuclear power plants to continue running until April 2023 was “a transparent ideological compromise to save the divided left-liberal coalition, but above all a dramatic wrong decision for our country and for climate protection”. Therefore, the Federal Government is being asked to “create the legal framework for extending the operating times of all three nuclear power plants remaining on the grid until at least the end of 2024 and for keeping the three recently decommissioned nuclear power plants in reserve”. Söder also demanded “finally to get fuel rods”.
In the eleven-page leading motion, the CSU calls for the expansion of renewable energies to be “accelerated in line with the market”. Bavaria will build “up to 1000 new wind turbines in the next few years”; most recently, there was always talk of “up to 800”, with the period being outlined in a similarly vague manner. In the application, the CSU made all kinds of other demands on the federal government: analogous to the LNG Acceleration Act, the traffic light should also accelerate the expansion of hydropower, biomass and geothermal energy.
New campaign slogan: “High-tech and homeland”
For base load geothermal energy, which is particularly lucrative in the greater Munich area, federal funding would have to be increased. To further relieve citizens, a price cap should not only be introduced for gas, but also for electricity, heating oil, pellets and petrol.
Söder said it was the CSU’s job to “give support, give hope” in these difficult times. His vision for Bavaria is to combine “modern technology with values”. The “high-tech agenda” is the “heart” of his government work. In his speech, which was well received by the delegates, he revealed which slogan had won the race for the upcoming election year: neither “Leberkäs and Laser” nor “Space Travel and Rosary”, but: “High-tech and Heimat”.
After an evening of delegates and the “Long Night of the CSU powered by JU”, the CSU will meet again this Saturday at the exhibition center in Augsburg, then the chairman of the sister party, Friedrich Merz, will speak to her. Söder emphasized what he saw as the improved relationship with the sister party: the CDU and CSU would “work together especially in difficult times”.
