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Werner Walde

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Werner Walde
Walde in 1984
First Secretary of the
Socialist Unity Party in Bezirk Cottbus
In office
1 June 1969 – 9 November 1989
Second Secretary
  • Hans Wetzel
  • Albrecht Schauerhammer
Preceded byAlbert Stief
Succeeded byWolfgang Thiel
Volkskammer
Member of the Volkskammer
for Bezirk Cottbus
In office
29 October 1976 – 16 November 1989
Preceded byHerbert Warnke
Succeeded byKarin Winkel
ConstituencyHoyerswerda, Senftenberg Weißwasser
In office
29 November 1971 – 29 October 1976
Preceded byAlbert Stief
Succeeded byHelga Labs
ConstituencyBad Liebenwerda, Finsterwalde, Herzberg, Jessen, Luckau, Lübben
Personal details
Born
Werner Walde

(1926-02-12)12 February 1926
Döbeln, Free State of Saxony, Weimar Republic
Died26 June 2010(2010-06-26) (aged 84)
Cottbus, Brandenburg, Germany
Political partySED-PDS
(1989–1990)
Other political
affiliations		Socialist Unity Party
(1946–1989)
Social Democratic Party
(1946)
Alma mater
Occupation
  • Politician
  • Party Functionary
  • Teacher
Awards
Central institution membership
Other offices held

Werner Walde (12 February 1926 – 26 June 2010) was a German politician and party functionary of the Socialist Unity Party (SED).

Throughout the 1970s and 1980s, he served as First Secretary of the SED in Bezirk Cottbus, the GDR's coal and energy Bezirk, and eventually became a candidate member of the SED Politburo.

Life and career

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Walde came from a working-class family.[1][2] After attending elementary school in Döbeln-Großbauchlitz, he completed training as an administrative employee from 1940 to 1943. He held leadership positions in the German Youth and the Hitler Youth. From June 1943 to April 1945, he was deployed in the Reich Labor Service in Poland, France, and the Netherlands, ultimately as the head foreman. In April 1945, he was conscripted into the Wehrmacht as a soldier and was captured in early May 1945 in Hagenow, initially by American forces, later ending up in British captivity from June to July 1945 in Eutin.[2]

After his release, he worked as a farm laborer for a farmer in Westerode until August 1945. He subsequently worked as an employee of the Social Security Fund in Döbeln until December 1950.[2] In 1945, he became a member of the Free German Trade Union Federation (FDGB) and was a member of the trade union leadership at his workplace from 1946.[2]

Early political career

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In February 1946, he joined the Social Democratic Party (SPD), which was forcibly merged with the Communist Party of Germany (KPD) to form the Socialist Unity Party of Germany (SED) April, and in 1948, he joined the Free German Youth (FDJ).[2]

In 1950, he attended the local SED Party School in Meißen. Afterward, Walde became a full-time SED party functionary, initially as assistant and teacher at the Meißen Party School, moving up to become deputy principal of the Bezirk Cottbus SED Party School in 1953, briefly serving as acting principal.[2]

Bezirk Cottbus SED career

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From 1954 to 1960, he pursued a distance learning program at the SED's "Karl Marx" Party Academy in Berlin, graduating with a diploma in social sciences (Dipl.-Ges.-Wiss.). Concurrently, he worked as a staff member and department head of the Bezirk Cottbus SED.[2]

In August 1961, he was made First Secretary of the SED in the mostly rural Bezirk Cottbus Senftenberg district, joining the SED's nomenklatura.[1][2]

He stepped down in February 1964 to study at the University of Economics in Berlin, earning a degree in economics (Dipl.-Ök.) in 1966. Walde subsequently rose to the Bezirk Cottbus SED Secretariat, being made Second Secretary, also responsible for Organization and Cadre Affairs, in April.[2]

Walde (right) and SED Agriculture Secretary Werner Felfe (right of center) visiting farmers in Schwarze Pumpe in July 1988

On 1 June 1969, Walde rose to the position of the First Secretary of the Bezirk Cottbus SED.[2][3][4][5] Albert Stief, who was ill at the time,[3] was transferred to the Council of Ministers of East Germany as Minister for the Guidance and Control of Bezirk and District Councils.

From 19 June 1971 (VIII. Party Congress) until its collective resignation in December 1989, he was a member of the Central Committee of the SED. From 22 May 1976 (IX. Party Congress) until his resignation in November 1989, he was a candidate member of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the SED,[2][6] the de facto highest leadership body in East Germany, the Bezirk Cottbus being an important centre for coal and energy.[3]

He additionally became a member of the Volkskammer in 1971,[2] nominally representing rural constituencies in his Bezirk, first the west,[7] then the southeast.[8]

Walde's twenty-year rule of Bezirk Cottbus was viewed was viewed ambivalently. While he lived a modest lifestyle for a top SED functionary and was viewed as sticking up for the districts in his Bezirk, he was known for being a hardliner when it came to military service and those refusing to do so. When it came to art and culture, he was orthodox and clueless, something he later admitted.[3]

Walde was awarded the Patriotic Order of Merit in 1967, 1969 and 1974, the Order of Karl Marx in 1976,[2] and the Hero of Labour title in 1986.[9]

Peaceful Revolution

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On 8 November 1989, on the eve of the fall of the Berlin Wall, Böhme was reelected to the Politburo at the 9th Meeting of the Central Committee.[2][10] Only a day later, he agreed to step down amidst pressure.[11] The Bezirk Cottbus SED installed reformer Wolfgang Thiel as his successor.[4][11] Walde consequently resigned from the Politburo he had just been reelected to.[2] He was removed by his party from the Volkskammer a week later, on 16 November 1989.[12]

On 20 January 1990, he was expelled from the now-renamed SED-PDS party in a unanimous vote,[2][13] the party Central Arbitration Commission citing personal enrichment and his energy policy mismanagement.[13] Nevertheless, Walde was contrite that he can no longer be "useful to the party of the working class".[14]

After the Peaceful Revolution, Walde retired, dying in Cottbus on 26 June 2010.[2]

[edit]

In the 2018 Gerhard Gundermann biopic Gundermann, Walde was portrayed by Hilmar Eichhorn.[15]

References

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  1. ^ a b "Chronik-Biographie: Werner Walde". www.chronikderwende.de. Retrieved 2023-11-04.
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q "Walde, Werner". www.bundesstiftung-aufarbeitung.de. Wer war wer in der DDR? (in German). Federal Foundation for the Reappraisal of the SED Dictatorship. 2009. Retrieved 2023-11-04.
  3. ^ a b c d "Aufstieg und Fall eines Parteisoldaten - Cottbuser Geschichten - Themen - WochenKurier". www.wochenkurier.info (in German). 2019-07-15. Retrieved 2023-11-04.
  4. ^ a b "Bezirksleitung der SED Cottbus (1952 - 1990)". www.bundesarchiv.de (in German). German Federal Archives. 2006. Retrieved 2024-12-28.
  5. ^ Parteiapparat der Deutschen Demokratischen Republik 1970 (PDF) (in German). Bonn: Gesamtdeutsche Institut – Bundesanstalt für gesamtdeutsche Aufgaben. 1971. p. 18. Retrieved 2025-01-01.
  6. ^ "Übersicht über die Mitglieder und Kandidaten des Politbüros des ZK der SED (1949-1989)". www.bundesarchiv.de. German Federal Archives. 2006. Retrieved 2024-12-28.
  7. ^ Volkskammer der Deutschen Demokratischen Republik 1971-1976 (PDF) (in German). VEB Staatsverlag der Deutschen Demokratischen Republik. 1972. p. 772. Retrieved 2024-12-28.
  8. ^ Volkskammer der Deutschen Demokratischen Republik 1976-1981 (PDF) (in German). VEB Staatsverlag der Deutschen Demokratischen Republik. 1977. p. 31. Retrieved 2024-12-28.
  9. ^ Hubrich, Dirk (2013). Verleihungsliste zum Ehrentitel "Held der Arbeit" der DDR von 1950 bis 1989 (PDF) (in German). Deutsche Gesellschaft für Ordenskunde e. V. p. 51.
  10. ^ "Modrow kommt - Krenz bleibt". Die Tageszeitung (in German). 1989-11-09. ISSN 0931-9085. Retrieved 2024-12-29.
  11. ^ a b Kleps, Erhard. "Rücktritte der 1. Sekretäre der SED-Bezirksleitungen im November 1989". www.ddr89.de (in German). Retrieved 2024-12-29.
  12. ^ Kleps, Erhard. "Chronik der DDR Donnerstag 16. November 1989". www.ddr89.de (in German). Retrieved 2024-12-29.
  13. ^ a b "Werner Walde", Ausschluss. Das Politbüro vor dem Parteigericht (in German), Rosa Luxemburg Foundation, retrieved 2023-11-04
  14. ^ Reinecke, Stefan (2020-01-20). "PDS-Rauswurf von Egon Krenz 1990: Belastung für die Partei". Die Tageszeitung (in German). ISSN 0931-9085. Retrieved 2023-12-16.
  15. ^ Gundermann (2018) - IMDb. Retrieved 2024-12-28 – via www.imdb.com.
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