Trouble at the carnival
Insults against Behrens? Fans and police disagree
05.03.2025 – 11:08 a.m.Reading time: 3 min.
Football fans expressed their displeasure with interior minister Daniela Behrens at the Braunschweig carnival. The police intervened. The measures are evident.
For weeks now, the preliminary run of the Lower Saxony Sender between Hannover 96 and Eintracht Braunschweig has been accompanying the debate about the once reduced guest support. In the duel of the rivals, significantly fewer Eintracht fans may be part of Sunday (1.30 p.m.) than usual. Numerous protest actions followed.
So also at the Braunschweig carnival parade last Sunday. In sight: Lower Saxony’s Interior Minister Daniela Behrens (SPD), who had significantly supported the decision to partly exclude the guest fans.
Braunschweig supporters placed equipped with a Behrens mask with a clown nose on the edge of the move. Also included: protest posters on which, among other things, the inscription “Get fan culture, Behrens must fall”.
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In addition to “Behrens out” speaking choirs, the Schoduvel continued to call from the crowd. The police regarded them as insults, according to their own statements, determined the identity of the interferers and initiated criminal proceedings against two people.
The blue and yellow help clearly criticized the police measures afterwards. The carnival is also the time when the authorities criticized and “taken on the shovel”, according to a statement on the Schoduvel.
The police reacted thinly to “alleged” insults. Because the public office of politicians like Daniela Behrens is a “critical consideration on the part of the population”.
The measures taken are considered excessive that the police campaign was “shot with cannons on sparrows”, writes the fan aid and describes its view. According to this, a group of around 25 people had been set on Friedrich-Wilhelm-Platz. “After determining the personal details and identification of the alleged perpetrators, the people were not let go again, but the group held onto an hour,” said the fan aid.
From the point of view of the fans, this indicates “a lack of democratic understanding – keyword freedom of expression”. It also says: “The suspicion arises that this measure should suffocate any criticism of the decisions of Minister Behrens with regard to the derby – forced reduction in the guest assembly by 40 percent.”
The police defended their own measures when asked by T-Online. From an approximately ten -member group, there were continuously several personal insults to the interior minister of the interior of Behrens. The boundary of the “taking it” was clearly exceeded, the police said.
When the group grew up to around 35 people and went to Friedrich-Wilhelm-Platz, “due to the occurrence of the group and the crimes committed (insults)”, they decided to control the relevant people.
Afterwards, the group was subjected to an identity assessment “for dangerous reasons”, the police continued. “Since they were also in the weapon ban zone shown by the city of Braunschweig, searches were also carried out.” The measures would have taken around an hour.
In the meantime, Behrens passed the control location with her car. Apart from “expressions of displeasure”, this happened without special occurrences. The people were then released.
Either way, the debate about the Behrens decision on the reduction in guest refefendance should remain a big topic. The Braunschweig fans already moved as part of a demonstration by the state capital and called for the boy’s boycott of the game in Hanover. After reducing the contingent, a maximum of 2,541 supporters of Eintracht in the Heinz of Heiden Arena should be there.