Berlin Wedding, Germany, 30th April 2012
7,000 police officers were deployed on Monday and Tuesday to keep the demonstrations under control. Traditionally, the violent “anticapitalist Walpurgis Night demo” has passed through Friedrichshain and Prenzlauer Berg. This time, it was unexpectedly relocated to the Sprengelkiez and Brüsseler Kiez in Wedding, an area between the Wedding S-Bahn station, the northern shore of the Berlin-Spandauer Shipping Canal, and See- and Müllerstraße. This is due to the new, extremely powerful theme of the revolutionary May Day demos in the autonomous and leftist scene: gentrification. According to the demonstration’s call, it is about “the displacement of the local population through the vicious cycle of changes in ownership, renovations, and rapidly rising rents.” Not only Kreuzberg, Friedrichshain, Mitte, and Prenzlauer Berg are affected, but also Wedding, according to the protesters.
Under the slogan “Take what is rightfully yours,” thousands of protesters will march through the neighborhood in the evening. The march starts at 8 pm at Wedding station, with 1,500 participants registered with the police. According to police reports, around 3,000 officers will be deployed the night before May Day. The route will take demonstrators through Burgsdorfstraße, Lynarstraße, Sparrplatz, Sprengelstraße, Amrumer Straße subway station, Ostender Straße, Genter Straße, Seestraße subway station, Müllerstraße, and Wedding subway station.
