Horst Sindermann

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Horst Sindermann, 1976

Horst Sindermann (born September 5, 1915 in Dresden , † April 20, 1990 in Berlin ) was a German politician ( SED ) and from 1973 to 1976 Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the GDR and from 1976 to 1989 President of the People's Chamber .

As chief agitator of the SED from 1953 to 1963, Sindermann invented the term " anti-fascist protective wall " for the Berlin Wall in 1961 .

Life

Horst Sindermann on the Dimitrov honor in Leipzig, 1949
Sindermann (3rd from right) in the stands at the celebration of the 25th anniversary of the erection of the anti-fascist protective wall in East Berlin , 1986

Sindermann was born on September 5, 1915, the son of the Saxon SPD functionary Karl Sindermann . His brother Kurt Sindermann was a member of the Saxon state parliament from 1929 to 1933 . After attending elementary school and secondary school , Sindermann became a member of the Communist Youth Association of Germany (KJVD) in 1929 . In 1933 he was arrested and sentenced to eight months in prison for joining the resistance against National Socialism . In 1935 Sindermann was sentenced to six years imprisonment in the Waldheim prison for preparation for high treason and was then imprisoned in the Sachsenhausen and Mauthausen concentration camps until 1945.

In 1945, after his liberation from the Mauthausen concentration camp by the US Army , he became a member of the KPD and in 1946 a member of the SED due to the forced unification of the SPD and KPD . Sindermann worked as editor-in-chief of the Sächsische Volkszeitung Dresden and the Volksstimme in Chemnitz . In the meantime he ran into problems with Otto Grotewohl , whom he criticized for his marriage to a former Nazi official. In 1950 the Central Party Control Commission investigated him for allegedly betraying communist comrades to the Gestapo during the Nazi regime , but his innocence was found in the proceedings. From 1950 to 1953 Sindermann was editor-in-chief of the newspaper Freiheit in Halle .

Between 1954 and 1963 Sindermann was head of the agitation department at the SED Central Committee . From 1963 to 1971 he was first secretary of the SED district leadership in Halle . In 1967 he was accepted into the Politburo of the SED. From 1971 to 1973 he was Deputy Chairman of the Council of Ministers.

From 1963 to 1989 he was a member of the People's Chamber . Sindermann elected them as chairman of the GDR Council of Ministers on October 3, 1973; his predecessor Willi Stoph was elected chairman of the Council of State . Because of too liberal economic policy, Honecker replaced him in 1976 with Stoph. This happened at the constituent meeting of the People's Chamber on October 29, 1976, at which Honecker himself was elected Chairman of the State Council, Stoph again Chairman of the Council of Ministers and Sindermann President of the People's Chamber. From 1976 to 1989, Sindermann was the third man in the state as president of the People's Chamber in terms of protocol, but otherwise entrusted with little influential tasks.

He was expelled from the SED / PDS on December 3, 1989 and was temporarily in custody . The public prosecutor's office and a committee of the People's Chamber investigated him on suspicion of having abused his privileges. However, no charges were brought.

After his release from pretrial detention, he gave an interview to Der Spiegel magazine in which he confessed: “We were chased away by the people, not by a 'counter-revolution'. We would be ridiculous if we wanted to declare Bärbel Bohley , Pastor Eppelmann and others to be 'counterrevolutionaries'. The nonviolent uprising did not fit into our theory. ”The interview was published two weeks after his death, according to the editors, he had still authorized the text . His autobiography remained unfinished; it ended in the post-war period 1945/46.

Horst Sindermann is buried in the cemetery for the victims and persecuted of the Nazi regime in the central cemetery in Friedrichsfelde .

His stepson was the actor Peter Sindermann . His grandson was the handball player and fashion designer Eric Sindermann .

Fonts (selection)

  • China's big leap (= international series ). Dietz-Verlag, Berlin 1959
  • Successfully advancing on the course of the 8th Party Congress: selected speeches and essays. Dietz-Verlag, Berlin 1975
  • Peace and socialism, state doctrine of the GDR. Selected speeches and essays. Dietz-Verlag, Berlin 1980
  • Everything for the people, everything with the people. Selected speeches and essays. Dietz-Verlag, Berlin 1985
  • Before daylight. Autobiography. With a foreword by Egon Krenz . Das Neue Berlin, 2015, ISBN 978-3-360-01871-7 .

literature

Web links

Commons : Horst Sindermann  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Christian Jung: History of Losers. Historical self-reflection of high-ranking members of the SED after 1989. In: Heidelberger Abhandlungen zur Middle and Modern History - New Series , Volume 16. Universitätsverlag Winter Heidelberg, Heidelberg 2007, ISBN 978-3-8253-5308-7 . Dissertation at Heidelberg University in 2006 under the title: From my life - Poetry and Truth , 387 pages.
  2. ↑ Manfred Weissbecker, Kurt Pätzold, Reinhard Kühnl: Rassismus, Faschismus, Antifaschismus . PapyRossa Verlag, 2000. ISBN 9783894381998 .
  3. ^ Karl Wilhelm Fricke: Martyrdom and abuse of power. In: Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung of March 1, 2016, p. 6.
  4. ^ Died - Horst Sindermann , Der Spiegel, April 23, 1990.
  5. ↑ Werner Harenberg: We weren't heroes. In: Der Spiegel from May 7, 1990.
  6. ↑ Horst Sindermann: Before daylight. Autobiography. Berlin 2015.
  7. ↑ http://www.berlin.friedparks.de/such/gedenkstaette.php?gdst_id=1588
personal data
SURNAME Sindermann, Horst
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German politician (KPD, SED), MdV, President of the People's Chamber of the GDR
DATE OF BIRTH September 5, 1915
PLACE OF BIRTH Dresden
DATE OF DEATH April 20, 1990
Place of death Berlin