Jürgen Scharf (born

Salzwedel Salzwedel (, officially known as Hansestadt Salzwedel; ) is a town in Saxony-Anhalt, Germany. It is the capital of the district (''Kreis'') of Altmarkkreis Salzwedel, and has a population of approximately 21,500. Salzwedel is located on the Ger ...

15 September 1952) is a German regional politician ( CDU). From April 2002 till 2011 he was the leader of the CDU group in the

Saxony-Anhalt Saxony-Anhalt ( ; ) is a States of Germany, state of Germany, bordering the states of Brandenburg, Saxony, Thuringia and Lower Saxony. It covers an area of and has a population of 2.17 million inhabitants, making it the List of German states ...

Regional Assembly.

Life

Jürgen Scharf was born in

approximately three years after the birth of the

German Democratic Republic East Germany, officially known as the German Democratic Republic (GDR), was a country in Central Europe from Foundation of East Germany, its formation on 7 October 1949 until German reunification, its reunification with West Germany (FRG) on ...

. Salzwedel was a small town known for its "Tree ring Cake" located on the eastern side of the

border Borders are generally defined as geography, geographical boundaries, imposed either by features such as oceans and terrain, or by polity, political entities such as governments, sovereign states, federated states, and other administrative divisio ...

dividing

West West is one of the four cardinal directions or points of the compass. It is the opposite direction from east and is the direction in which the Sun sets on the Earth. Etymology The word "west" is a Germanic word passed into some Romance langu ...

from

East Germany East Germany, officially known as the German Democratic Republic (GDR), was a country in Central Europe from Foundation of East Germany, its formation on 7 October 1949 until German reunification, its reunification with West Germany (FRG) on ...

. A few months before his birth the East German government blocked the frontier, and the ensuing three decades saw the construction of an increasingly sophisticated barrier created to protect the

from western military aggression and/or from the flight of its own working age population. Scharf successfully concluded his schooling in 1971 and went on to study

Mathematics Mathematics is a field of study that discovers and organizes methods, Mathematical theory, theories and theorems that are developed and Mathematical proof, proved for the needs of empirical sciences and mathematics itself. There are many ar ...

at the "Otto-von-Guericke" Technical University in

Magdeburg Magdeburg (; ) is the Capital city, capital of the Germany, German States of Germany, state Saxony-Anhalt. The city is on the Elbe river. Otto I, Holy Roman Emperor, Otto I, the first Holy Roman Emperor and founder of the Archbishopric of Mag ...

, emerging with a degree in 1975. 1975 was also the year in shich his wife gave birth to their daughter. In 1976 he joined the Christian Democratic Union (CDU / ''Christlich-Demokratische Union Deutschlands''), a political party which in the eastern version of Germany was part of the National Front, an organisational structure that kept all political parties and mass organisations under the ultimate control of the country's ruling Socialist Unity Party of Germany (SED / ''Sozialistische Einheitspartei Deutschlands'') until 1989. He worked, till 1990, in applied research in the field of paints and coatings. Between 1978 and 1983 he also served as district councillor, representing the "Magdeburg south-east" electoral district. At the time of

reunification A political union is a type of political entity which is composed of, or created from, smaller politics or the process which achieves this. These smaller polities are usually called federated states and federal territories in a federal govern ...

, in 1990, the eastern and western versions of the CDU (party) also merged, and Scharf became the Party Chairman for Magdeburg. 1990 was also the year in which he was one of the co-founders of the Magdeburg Cathedral School (actually the re-founding of a venerable institution which, prior to 1949, had been able to trace its origins back far enough to number

Martin Luther Martin Luther ( ; ; 10 November 1483 – 18 February 1546) was a German priest, Theology, theologian, author, hymnwriter, professor, and former Order of Saint Augustine, Augustinian friar. Luther was the seminal figure of the Reformation, Pr ...

among its alumni). Since 1990 he has been chairman of the works council with Magdeburg Lacke GmbH and the derivative research business separated out of it in 2014, Institut fuer Lacke und Farben e.V. Following regional elections in October 1990 he became a leading member of the legislative assembly (''Landtag'') for

, continuing to sit as an assembly member till April 2011. Between 1990 and 1993 and again from 1994 till 2002 he was the CDU group's Assembly Geschäftsfuehrer (literally "''parliamentary business leader''"), also serving as his party's regional finance spokesman, while between 1993 and 1994 he served as the party's deputy leader there. Between April 2002 and 2011 Jürgen Scharf was the leader of the CDU group in the

Regional Assembly. Along with his political duties, Scharf was for many years a member of the Synod of Evangelical Churches in the

Saxony Saxony, officially the Free State of Saxony, is a landlocked state of Germany, bordering the states of Brandenburg, Saxony-Anhalt, Thuringia, and Bavaria, as well as the countries of Poland and the Czech Republic. Its capital is Dresden, and ...

province. In the past he also served, from 2002, as chairman on the advisory board of the

state lottery.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Scharf, Jurgen 1952 births Living people People from Salzwedel Sportspeople from Bezirk Magdeburg Christian Democratic Union (East Germany) politicians Christian Democratic Union of Germany politicians