Bavaria Party

The Bavaria Party ( _de. Bayernpartei) is a political party in the state of Bavaria in southern Germany. It was founded in 1946 and describes itself as patriotic Bavarian, advocating Bavarian independence within the European Union. Together with the Christian Social Union it can be seen as an heir to the Bavarian People's Party which existed prior to World War II. The party had some successes at the polls in the late 1940s and 1950s: 20.9 % of the vote in 1949 and 17 seats in the German Bundestag and, in 1950, 17.9 % and 39 seats in the Bavarian state parliament where it formed a coalition with the Bavarian branches of the Social Democratic Party of Germany and the Free Democratic Party. This forced the Christian Social Union out of power for three years. Later, the Bavaria Party rapidly lost voters. It still exists but was last elected to the Bavarian state parliament in 1962. In the 2008 local elections, however, the party won 38 seats (compared to 32 in 2002), mostly in Upper Bavaria, including one of the 80 seats in the City Council of Munich, the 1.3 million capital, after 32 years of absence there. The current chairman of the party is Florian Weber from Regensburg in the Upper Palatinate.

References

See also: List of political parties in Germany

External links

* [http://www.bayernpartei.de Bavaria Party web site (in German)]