Germany ‘risks having two parallel societies’ amid migration fears

Germany risks having two parallel societies if it does not demand integration from migrants, expert warns

  • Professor Horst Opaschowski said Germany was now ‘a country of immigration’
  • He warned the migrant issue would occupy German society for the next 20 years
  • The government should do ‘everything possible’ to ensure integration, he said 

Germany will become two ‘parallel societies’ if it does not demand integration from migrants, an expert has warned. 

Professor Horst Opaschowski said Germany had ‘become a country of immigration overnight’ and said the refugee issue was likely to occupy German society for the next 20 years. 

Mr Opaschowski, who describes himself as a ‘futurologist’ and political consultant, said the refugees and migrants who have arrived in Germany in recent years were likely to remain there. 

Writing in Bild, he said the German government had to do ‘everything possible’ to ensure integration.  

Germany will become two ‘parallel societies’ if it does not demand integration from migrants, Professor Horst Opaschowski (pictured) has warned 

He said he did not regard immigration as a bad thing in itself but called for more ‘honesty’ from political leaders. 

The number of asylum applications, at more than 150,000 a year, was ‘as many as a whole city,’ the professor said. 

He wrote: ‘Germany has become a country of immigrants in the middle of Europe overnight. Immigration will change Germany – but it’s not yet clear how. 

‘But if the state doesn’t do everything possible to integrate migrants and demand integration from them, the project will fail.

‘There is a danger that two parallel societies will come about.’ 

Going on to write about poverty and standard of living, he called for a ‘vision’ for Germany equivalent to John F. Kennedy’s dream of landing on the Moon. 

It has also emerged that only 35 per cent of migrants arriving in Germany are eligible for asylum. 

The decision by German Chancellor Angela Merkel (pictured in Brussels last week) to open her country's doors to migrants has sparked a backlash in the country

The decision by German Chancellor Angela Merkel (pictured in Brussels last week) to open her country’s doors to migrants has sparked a backlash in the country 

Hans-Eckhard Sommer, the head of the government office for migrants and refugees, said ‘too many people come without a valid asylum reason’. 

Almost two-thirds of the 162,000 applications processed last year were accepted, he said.  

The wave of immigration into Germany has provoked a huge backlash and sparked the greatest challenge of Angela Merkel’s 13-year reign in Berlin. 

Tensions over Merkel’s 2015 decision to open Germany’s doors to a million asylum seekers have helped the anti-migrant Alternative for Germany (AfD) party rise to prominence. 

The tension has been greatest in the former East Germany where unemployment is still higher than that in the West, almost 30 years since the Berlin Wall came down. 

Merkel has said she will not seek a fifth term, meaning she will leave office in 2021 at the latest.   

Read more at DailyMail.co.uk