Splitting the left is never a good idea. After Dietmar Bartsch, head of the parliamentary group of the left party, announced his resignation from this post last week, the probability of this happening is very, very high.” Both withdrawals will take place this September. Bartsch hints, he The most praised name of the German Left for months, Sahra Wagenknecht, 54 years old, mediatic, sharp and inflexible. According to some, the emancipation and essence of the party with communist origin; A nightmare that could hasten the collapse of this establishment for others, he is a defender of extremist positions that bring him closer to the far right on issues such as the refusal to provide asylum or arms supply to Ukraine.
“Of course, I will fight until the last minute so that the division does not happen. I was always ready for dialogue “Together with Wagenknecht,” added Bartsch. The double withdrawal at the head of the smallest parliamentary group in the Bundestag has little to do with the current weakness of a party that continues to hold seats in the federal parliament, not because of its percentage of representation. A handful of victories in the traditional regions of eastern Germany. in the generals of 2021 4.9%, below the minimum 5% required for direct access to the Bundestag. But according to German electoral law, he won enough (at least three) direct seats or victories to form representatives and his own parliamentary group in these districts.
While Bartsch represents the current of moderates, Muhammad Ali is among Wagenknecht’s supporters. While both announced their withdrawal from office a few days apart, the moderates have so far tried to expel Wagenknecht from the party, but without success.
Combination of left parties
This is the myriad of struggles for the survival of a party that emerged from the merger of Gregor Gysi’s post-communist Party for Democratic Socialism (PDS) and the social democratic opposition Oskar Lafontaine dragged with it in 1999. its timeless double resignation Just six months after the head of the Social Democratic Party (SPD) and co-religionist Gerhard Schröder came to power as Finance Minister at the head of the then revolutionary red-green coalition. The German SPD never got over this tear, and the two alpha males in the movie, Schröder and Lafontaine, have not spoken to each other since – as it’s known.
Lafontaine later attributed his political fate to that of Gysi, the architect of the post-communist PDS resurgence that the rest of the German parliamentary class sought to corner. His PDS was brutally “heir to the Berlin Wall regime“and it was jointly rejected by both the conservative opposition and the SPD or the Greens. The Left emerged from the union between Lafontaine and Gysi, and with it the party ceased to be just a politically viable bastion in the ex-communist. Regionally it was a coalition partner with the SPD and the Greens. and the security cordon around the Left, who led the government of the state of Thuringia, was gradually lowered.
The political union that created the Left was followed by another that expanded into the personal sphere: Lafontaine became the partner and later husband of Wagenknecht, who had been leader since the founding of the communist wing of the PDS. This intersection means that there is now talk of this topic in Germany. second inner tear At a party with or without a direct connection to Lafontaine.
ideological balances
The former leader of the SPD had already withdrawn from the vanguard of the Left after the Russian invasion of Ukraine, opposing the “soft line” advocated by the rest of the party. That is, trying to strike a balance between condemning Moscow’s war of aggression and simultaneously opposing the arms supply. Lafontaine, like Wagenknecht, advocates loyalty or “understanding” towards the Kremlin at a level comparable only to the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) across the German parliamentary spectrum. Such proximity between the two ends of the Bundestag is not limited to their positions in relation to Kiev and Ukraine; refuse to accept refugees or fight against it climate change. Wagenknecht’s interventions in Parliament (he was the leader of the parliamentary group until 2019) or his interventions in meetings or other forums often differ little from what AfD leader Alice Weidel says.
Wagenknecht has been flirting with the idea of starting a new party for months. The rest of the left trembles. Splitting in a party that can’t even capture at least 5 percent is a death threat. It is estimated that Wagenknecht could drag a few of the 39 deputies who were next to La Izquierda. If it drops below 37, the parliamentary caucus will lose its status, which means the loss of seats in parliamentary committees, the vice-president in the lower house, influence and political visibility, in addition to the cuts in funding it receives for each seat. Wagenknecht’s hypothetical new party now estimated 15% of the vote in a poll in the popular newspaper ‘Bild’. Not only because of those who screwed the Left, but also because A new “vote of protest” leaving the AfD to be hailed. The question is whether it will continue to be defined as a leftist, a far-right, or in the orbit of other European movements that are difficult to place on one side or the other. vote of discontent or tension.
The moderate current is trying to reactivate the Gysi. Charismatic and historical leader, key to effective and successful revivals Gysi, 75 of the party and who had suffered multiple heart attacks in his medical history, retired and then returned to the political arena several times. His next appointment on the party’s future will be on September 4, when he should participate in the election of new chairmen of the parliamentary group and perhaps formalizing the new left rift in German politics.