FDP leader Lindner defends political offer in East Germany

The FDP, which is facing disastrous election results in eastern Germany, is actually making an attractive political offer to the people there, according to its chairman Christian Lindner. "Our set of values is exactly what many people are really looking for," says Lindner in the latest episode of his podcast "CL+".

This applies, for example, to freedom of lifestyle - "so you won't be told from the center of Berlin that you can no longer drive a diesel, that you can no longer grill a pork chop, but that's your decision - right down to the heating you use in the basement, by the way". Lindner also mentioned the FDP's positions on performance, freedom of expression and migration control. "For many more East German citizens, this should be an exciting offer," emphasized the FDP leader.

According to the polls, however, the Liberals will fall well short of the five-percent hurdle in the three state elections in Thuringia, Saxony and Brandenburg in September. They are polling at 2 to 3 percent in each of these states.

Literature professor Dirk Oschmann, with whom the party leader and Federal Finance Minister spoke in his new podcast, attested to the notorious lack of success of both the FDP and the Greens in eastern Germany. "The FDP and the Greens have never got a foot on the ground in the east, nowhere, except perhaps in the larger cities." The FDP is a party "in which the East (...) by and large cannot be found".

Oschmann had attracted attention with his book "The East: a West German invention".