Berlin / Stuttgart (dpa / lsw) – The district chairman of the CDU Württemberg-Hohenzollern, Thomas Bareiß, urges clarification quickly on the question of the CDU federal chairmanship. In a message on Sunday, he welcomed the vote of the district chairperson’s conference for a member survey on the successor to party leader Armin Laschet. “The important thing now is to involve party members.” Much trust has been lost in the last few months and years. The debate made it clear: “The reasons for the election defeat are many.” After 16 years in government by Angela Merkel, many people would no longer die of the CDU as a party. “We just lack the goal and the essential fundamentals,” said Bareiß, who is at the same time in the Bundestag and in the CDU federal executive committee.

Baden-Württemberg’s parliamentary group leader Manuel Hagel also welcomed the greater involvement of CDU members in the search for a new federal party leader. “It was a really good discussion. That we involve the members as much as possible is spot on now,” he told the German Press Agency in Karlsruhe on Saturday. Hagel, who is the district chairman of the CDU Alb-Donau-Ulm, emphasizes: “Replacing the head alone is not enough. After the personal change, we can also change the content.”

The will to digitize party work is absolutely there, he said after the conference. A party double leadership of men and women, as with the Greens or the SPD, was not a big issue. He himself is not a great friend of it either. “It has grown with the Greens, with the SPD it was an act of desperation, with us it would be an imitation. That would not be for us.”

The CDU had invited its 326 district and 27 district chairmen to Berlin to deal with the historically poor result of the federal election of 24.1 percent and to discuss the procedure for electing the new party leadership. The conference itself was only able to obtain a picture of its opinion and not make any binding decisions. These are to be met next Tuesday at special meetings of the Presidium and the Federal Board. According to current law, the election of the chairman must take place at a party congress.

© dpa-infocom, dpa: 211031-99-808081 / 2