Owner Sven Lohse, who doesn’t even support the party, and said he rented out the function room to the party because he “believes in democracy and everyone being allowed to discuss their thoughts openly without being attacked”.
However, this was lost on the so-called “anti-fascists” who decided to smash up his restaurant because they disagree with AFD policy.
Lohse told German newspaper, Junge Freiheit “Car tires were slashed, windows and facades smashed, horse manure was left by the door, I was cursed at and threatened on the phone – and all in the name of democracy.
“I’m not doing this anymore. I am now 56 years old. I do not want to burden the rest of my life with such ignoramuses,” he added, stating that he had never seen anything like it in his life, “not even in the third world”.
After a series of ongoing and massive threats of violence, the restaurant owner from Schleswig-Holstein closed his restaurant.
Three weeks after the state elections in Schleswig-Holstein, Lohse had enough: after repeated threats, he has closed his inn “Tivoli” in Aukrug near Neumünster. His “offense” in the eyes of his opponents: the AfD rented rooms for their events in support of the regional election campaign.
As a reported of the Kieler Nachrichten noted on Tuesday, there have been numerous attacks on the restaurant in the past months. Entrance doors were smeared with slogans, horse manure with shredded AfD electoral cards unloaded at the door, and car tires were slashed.
The police suspect political motives. In the Internet, left-wing extremists boast of their deeds. However, there have been no arrests.
A country that does not tolerate criticism is no longer a democracy, Lohse says. “I was always proud to be a German,” he said and added that he had a right to talk to anyone, even the Turkish president: “Erdogan should also talk to me.”