Parties - Bartsch: End of the Left Party marks a turning point for the Left in Europe
The political demise of the Left Party in the Bundestag is a turning point for the Left in Germany and Europe, according to its former chairman Dietmar Bartsch. "The end of the Left parliamentary group in the Bundestag is a bitter defeat for us," Bartsch told the Rheinische Post newspaper. The parliamentary group has been political history since midnight. Its own decision to disband took effect at 00:00 on Wednesday night. The background to this is the resignation of Sahra Wagenknecht and nine other MPs from the Left Party.
Due to the dissolution of the parliamentary group, its 108 employees will be dismissed. Some are likely to join the Left Party group or the Wagenknecht group at a later date. Bartsch told the Redaktionsnetzwerk Deutschland (RND) that the Left Party as a group will continue to employ some of the staff, "but in the end there will be significantly fewer because the global subsidies for the parliamentary group will be missing in future." Unfortunately, this is the end for many.
The former parliamentary group members want to reorganize themselves into two different groups in the Bundestag: the remaining 28 Left Party MPs on the one hand and the ten members of the "Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance" on the other. The Left Party has already applied to the Bundestag for this, and Wagenknecht's group intends to do so next week.
Such groups generally have fewer rights in the Bundestag than parliamentary groups and also receive less financial support from the state. The details will be regulated in a Bundestag resolution. It remains to be seen when the plenary will decide on this.
Bartsch: "I don't feel threatened by Sahra Wagenknecht "
Wagenknecht's fellow campaigner Christian Leye told the German Press Agency that the dissolution of the parliamentary group was naturally accompanied by melancholy. "There are people in the parliamentary group, but also in the party, who I greatly respect and above all value. In the end, however, it was a political decision: The majority of functionaries in the Left no longer faced up to the crises of the time." Bartsch, on the other hand, emphasized at the digital media house Table.Media that Wagenknecht was addressing dissatisfied people who did not want to vote for the Left or the AfD. "I don't feel threatened by Sahra Wagenknecht."
The Left Party parliamentary group was founded in 2005 by members of the Linkspartei.PDS and the WASG, two years before the formal merger of the two parties. As the parliamentary group would fall short of the minimum size of 37 seats without the ten parliamentarians around Wagenknecht, it decided in November to liquidate as of December 6. The so-called liquidation process could take months or years because all contractual relationships have to be settled. This includes the dismissal of around 100 employees.
Read also:
- Year of climate records: extreme is the new normal
- Precautionary arrests show Islamist terror threat
- Numerous oil, gas and coal lobbyists at climate conference
- COP28: Emirates announce fund for climate projects
Source: www.stern.de
