Günter Piening

After completing his studies in Sociology with the focal point "development planning and development politics" and a short excursion into the extracurricular youth development work, in 1978 Günter Piening began working at a Newspaper in Bielefeld, Germany. In 1983, he subsequently became co-founder of the alternative newspaper "Bielefelder StadtBlatt", which he was the editor of until 1988. He later went abroad to Japan, China, South-East Asia, and Western Africa. As a freelance journalist, he worked in depthly, exploring the Japanese community, culture and history. He also became very passionate about African films. In 1991 Piening became a Press officer in the Parliament for the Buendis 90-Die Gruenen in the State Parliament of Saxony-Anhalt. He is co-founder of a refugee aid society in Magdeburg and concentrates his work on xenophobia. In 1996 he became the foreigner delegate to the Saxony-anhalt state government. In this function he produced a memorandum in 2002, entitled, “immigration in the new states.” Since June 1, 2003 Guenter Pienung has been a delegate to the Berlin senate for Integration and Migration.