Dieter Pützhofen

Candidate poster for the state elections in North Rhine-Westphalia in 1985

Dieter Pützhofen (born May 14, 1942 in Krefeld ) is a politician ( CDU ).

Life

After an apprenticeship, evening grammar school and college of education, he was a teacher, deputy principal, rector and school councilor, and later school authority director for the district president of Düsseldorf . Pützhofen is married and has two children.

politics

Pützhofen became a member of the Junge Union in 1962 and the CDU in 1969. In 1975 he was a councilor in Krefeld . From 1981 to 1989 and from 1994 to 2004 he was Lord Mayor of the City of Krefeld.

After the clear defeat of the CDU in the state elections in 1985 , in which Pützhofen had also failed as a state candidate, he took over the chairmanship of the CDU Rhineland . Soon he was considered the new hope of his party in North Rhine-Westphalia and was referred to in the press as the Kennedy of the Lower Rhine . However, its popularity began again after an appearance on the ZDF talk show What now ...? to decline in January 1986 after he did not show himself to be equal to his opponent, the Green politician Joschka Fischer , in the discussion . Two months later, Pützhofen was unable to prevail over Kurt Biedenkopf in the union of the CDU regional associations of Rhineland and Westphalia-Lippe in the fight for the chairmanship of the new regional association of North Rhine-Westphalia . He retained the post of First Deputy State Chairman . As a result, there was a fierce internal power struggle between Pützhofen and Biedenkopf, so that the federal party felt compelled to intervene. According to the news magazine Der Spiegel , the General Secretary of the Federal CDU, Heiner Geißler , accused Pützhofen of leading a pointless, party-damaging dispute. Ultimately, in 1987, both Pützhofen and his competitor Biedenkopf had to withdraw from state politics in North Rhine-Westphalia.

Pützhofen was a member of the Bundestag from 1990 to 1999. In 1990 and 1994 he won the direct mandate in the Krefeld constituency and in 1998 he entered the Bundestag via the CDU state list .

honors and awards

• Cross of Merit on Ribbon of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany (1983)
• Accolade as a Knight of the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem (October 1991)
• Cross of Merit 1st Class of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany (August 28, 2000)

Web links

• Biography at the German Bundestag
• Dieter Pützhofen near the city of Krefeld

Individual evidence

1. ↑ The outsider did it in : Die Zeit , No. 41/1985, accessed on May 16, 2015.
2. ^ Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung: CDU North Rhine-Westphalia - History of the State Association , accessed on May 16, 2015.
3. ↑ Joschka Fischer . In: Der Spiegel . No. 6 , 1986 ( online ). , accessed on May 16, 2015.
4. ↑ Heading early in the morning . In: Der Spiegel . No. 7 , 1987 ( online ). , accessed on May 16, 2015.
5. ↑ All do . In: Der Spiegel . No. 10 , 1987 ( online ). , accessed on May 16, 2015.
6. ↑ New face . In: Der Spiegel . No. 19 , 1987 ( online ). , accessed on May 16, 2015.

predecessor	Office	successor
Hansheinz Hauser Willi Wahl	Lord Mayor of Krefeld 1982–1989 1994–2004	Willi Wahl Gregor Kathstede