Germany’s second most popular party, the Alternative for Germany, is pushing to make the ‘controlled dissolution of the EU’ one of its key manifesto policies at the upcoming European elections.
Voters across the bloc will head for the polls next June, for what could be an historic EU election that sees a “historic realignment”.
Germany’s AfD has now called for a “controlled dissolution” of the “overbearing EU”.
Co-leader of the party, Tino Chrupalla, said: “We’re demanding a reset for Europe so that we can use the potential of nation-states and rebuild the bridge to the east”.
Mr Chrupalla added the EU is an “economic area alone and should remain one”, and argument bearing a close resemblance to those used by Brits during the 2016 referendum.
He argued the EU “hogs national competencies without being able to replace the nation-state”, as well as criticising its lack of democracy and political legitimacy.”
The policy, which would likely lead to Germany leaving the EU were the AfD to get into power, calls for a new “European economic and interest-based community, a league of European nations” instead.
While the AfD called for the dissolution of the EU when it first formed, the positions of right wing parties across Europe softened following Brexit.
Both Marine le Pen’s nationalist French party and Matteo Salvini’s Italian Lega party have backed away from trying to ‘Brexit’ their countries out of the bloc.
Mr Chrupalla is optimistic, however, that Eurosceptic right-wing parties will do well in next year’s election, especially in Austria and Hungary.
“The prospects [for implementing the proposal] are good as the global trend is in our favour.”
In Austria, the right-wing Freedom Party is leading in the polls, and Victory Urban is polling around 20 points higher than his second-place rivals in Hungary.
In May, Sweden’s second-largest party – and a key member of the governing coalition – once against raised the prospect of their exit from the EU.
The party’s leader, Jimmie Akesson, argued Sweden must “take measures and steps so that our country is prepared to leave the EU”.
“We Sweden Democrats now want to investigate how our country can prevent more transfer of power to the EU, maximise our influence and achieve better negotiation results.”
“In order for preparedness to be credible, it is necessary that we remove the writings in the constitution that state that Sweden is a member of the EU.”
