He trained as a specialist in internal medicine until 1961, and also trained as a subspecialist in infectious diseases and tropical medicine.[1] He then became head of the 3rd medical clinic at the district hospital in Dessau and later served as the leading chief physician there.[1][2]
The Society for Infectious and Tropical Medicine elected him as its deputy chair; he also served as chairman of the local chapter of the German Red Cross in the GDR.[1]
Peaceful Revolution
Menzel became politically active during the Peaceful Revolution in the GDR. In January 1990, he was one of the co-founders of the Committee for the Formation of a Free Democratic Party in the GDR,[1][3] and in the following month, he was elected chairman at the party's founding convention in wealthy Berlin-Weißensee.[1][2][3][4][5][excessive citations] He was the favored candidate of the West German FDP leadership because he was not as opposed to a possible merger with a renewed LDPD as the East Berlin founding circle.[4]
The party struggled, it had low membership and it was hardly possible to build up its own structures. Even the West German FDP paid more attention to the former bloc party LDP with its over 100,000 members.[3][5][6]
The BFD ultimately elected 21 members to the Volkskammer,[3] including, initially, only 4 GDR-FDP members. Menzel himself was elected to the Volkskammer for Bezirk Halle, being the first-placed candidate on the BFD list. However, he resigned from his mandate before the first session to focus more on party work. He was replaced by LDP member Gerry Kley.
After merging with the West German FDP into the unified FDP in August 1990,[3][4][5] Menzel became their deputy chairman, a position he held until 1992. He was re-elected as a member of the federal board at the party congresses in 1993 and 1995.[1][2]
In 1992, Menzel became deputy chairman of the FDP in Saxony-Anhalt. When embattled chairman Peter Kunert resigned after the disastrous results of the June 1994 state election, Menzel, who himself would not be re-elected to the Bundestag in the 1994 federal election, took over as acting leader until the party elected Cornelia Pieper in early 1995.[2]
