Werner Wittig (politician)

As the son of a farm laborer, he attended elementary school in Luckenwalde from 1933 to 1941 and completed an apprenticeship as a commercial clerk there from 1942 to 1944. Wittig applied for membership in the NSDAP^[1] on 17 February 1944, and was admitted on 20 April (Hitler's birthday) of the same year (membership number 10,090,408). From June 1944 to May 1945, he was a soldier in the Wehrmacht.^[2]

After the war, he initially worked as a kitchen helper in a large kitchen in Luckenwalde. In August 1945, he became a member of the SPD (Social Democratic Party of Germany), and after the forced merger of the SPD and KPD (Communist Party of Germany) into the SED in the Soviet Occupation Zone (SBZ) in 1946, he became a member of the SED (Socialist Unity Party of Germany).^[2]

After attending the State Party School in Schmerwitz near Wiesenburg/Mark, he worked full-time for the SED. His first role was as the state youth secretary of the Mark Brandenburg SED (1946/47). From 1948, he was the personal assistant to the chairman of the Brandenburg SED, Willy Sägebrecht, and from January 1949, head of the department in the office of the state chairman of the SED.^[2][3]

From April 1952 to August 1953, he was the First Secretary of the SED in Potsdam City in the then State of Brandenburg and later Bezirk Potsdam.^[2][4] After attending the CPSU Higher Party School "W. I. Lenin" in Moscow from 1953 to 1956, he was appointed department head in the Bezirk Potsdam SED.^[2]

Subsequently, from January 1961 to June 1964, he was the First Secretary of the SED in Brandenburg an der Havel.^[2][5]

In June 1964, Wittig rose to the position of the First Secretary of the Bezirk Potsdam SED,^[1][2][5][6] longtime incumbent Kurt Seibt joining the Council of Ministers of East Germany as Minister of the newly created Ministry for the Guidance and Control of Bezirk and District Councils.^[7]

Wittig additionally became a full member of the Central Committee of the SED in April 1967 (VII. Party Congress) and the Volkskammer in later that year,^[2] nominally representing a constituency in the rural north of his Bezirk.^[8]

On behalf of Walter Ulbricht, Wittig was one of the main people responsible for the demolition of the Garnisonkirche ruins, despite opposition from a small part of the city council, including allegedly the then mayor of Potsdam, Brunhilde Hanke.^[9]

In 1970, Erich Honecker proposed him along with Harry Tisch as the chairman of the Volkskammer Committee for National Defense and successor to the late Paul Fröhlich. However, this failed due to a calculated move by Honecker, who proposed Hermann Matern at the last minute, as his preferred candidate, Paul Verner, would not have been accepted by Ulbricht, and he saw Matern as an interim solution until the planned ousting of Ulbricht.^[10]

Wittig was awarded the Patriotic Order of Merit in silver in 1965, the Banner of Labor in 1969, the Medal Brotherhood in Arms in gold in 1970 and the Kampforden „Für Verdienste um Volk und Vaterland“ in gold.^[2]

Wittig unexpectedly died in Potsdam in January 1976 at the age of 49.^[2][11] He was succeeded by his deputy Günther Jahn.^[5]

During the GDR era, a POS in today's Berlin district of Staaken (Spandau borough), the Potsdam Polytechnic Secondary School 45, and a street in the Waldstadt II residential area were named after him. His grave is located in an honor grove at the New Cemetery in Potsdam.^[12]

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