Parties – Party conference in Halle: The Left is trying to restart – politics

Halle (dpa) – The Left is looking for a way out of its deep crisis at a three-day federal party conference in Halle in Saxony-Anhalt. After a series of electoral defeats, the two chairmen Martin Schirdewan and Janine Wissler say goodbye with a general debate before a new board is elected on Saturday. Favorites for the successor are the journalist Ines Schwerdtner and the former member of the Bundestag Jan van Aken.

A key proposal entitled “Against the tide” focuses on redistribution, social security for rent, health, care, wages and rents. At the same time, the paper is committed to migration and asylum law, to climate protection and to the diplomatic pursuit of peace.

The Middle East conflict and the fight against anti-Semitism are also topics at the party conference and could cause controversy. Schwerdtner and van Aken warned in “Spiegel” against damaging Hamas. “Anyone who does not understand that the Hamas attack was a terrorist attack that has nothing to do with the liberation struggle does not represent a left-wing position in my opinion,” said van Aken.

The issue of unconditional basic income is also unclear internally. In addition, there are proposals to limit MPs’ diets and mandates in parliaments to two legislative periods.

Three problems

“The Left is undoubtedly in a dangerous situation that threatens its existence,” says the draft of the leading motion. There are essentially three reasons for this:

– A year ago, the former Left Party leader Sahra Wagenknecht began founding her own party. This was preceded by years of disputes with Wissler and Schirdewan and an ongoing debate about whether and how the division could be stopped.

– Left-wing issues such as tax increases for the rich, abolition of the debt brake, higher social benefits or ambitious climate goals are hardly popular with the public. They are in the shadow of the discussion about limiting migration and the war in Ukraine, with which the Sahra Wagenknecht alliance and the AfD were successful in elections.

– The Left failed to pass the five percent hurdle in the 2021 federal election and has experienced one electoral blow after another since then. Most recently, she lost heavily in the European elections and the state elections in Thuringia, Saxony and Brandenburg. In Brandenburg it flew out of an East German parliament for the first time since German unification in 1990.

Three possible solutions

– The party would like to focus on a few social issues and promise help to people with everyday problems. An example would be the demand for a rent cap to combat rising housing costs. In a year, every voter should know exactly what the Left stands for, the party says.

– A model for a successful election campaign is the Leipzig candidate Nam Duy Nguyen, who rang thousands of doorbells with helpers and thus won a direct mandate for the Saxon state parliament. The same approach should help nationwide: talk and listen to what voters really want. The party sees this as a counterattack against populists who, in their view, only claim to be close to the people.

– The Left is encouraged by the many new members who have joined in the past few months. According to outgoing chairman Wissler, there have been more than 10,000 since October 2023. However, scores of members had previously resigned. According to party information, the Left currently has a good 52,600 members. At the end of 2022 there were still a good 54,200.

The goal: parliamentary group strength in the Bundestag

The Left’s declared goal is to regain parliamentary group strength in the Bundestag after the next election. It is currently only three to four percent in surveys nationwide. From the perspective of the possible leadership duo Schwerdtner and Van Aken, co-governing in the federal government is currently not an issue for the Left. “There is simply not enough overlap with the Greens and the SPD,” Schwerdtner told “Spiegel”. At the country level, you have to look on a case-by-case basis to see where something might fit.

© dpa-infocom, dpa:241018-930-263610/1