ONE in five Germans would like to have the Berlin Wall back, according to a poll released ahead of the 17th anniversary of German reunification.
Nineteen percent of respondents surveyed said the country was better off while it was divided, while 75 percent said they were glad the Wall that kept easterners captives of the communist bloc for 28 years had fallen.
Remarkably, a full 21 percent of the country’s 16.7 million easterners felt nostalgic about the concrete, barbed wire and armed guards that separated them from the west.
The poll conducted by independent opinion research firm Emnid found 74 percent of easterners had felt like second-class citizens since Germany reunited on October 3, 1990.