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Chief search at the SPD: The malice came prematurely

2019-09-08T18:43:32.678Z


The procedure with which the SPD wants to find a new leadership duo works. A clear favorite is not yet in sight. Teams, tactics, excitement - the match report for the fourth regional conference.



venue

The Bürgerzentrum Neue Vahr in the east of Bremen. The Neue Vahr district was planned as the largest construction project in Europe on the drawing board in the 1960s and became the epitome of social democratic housing policy in the 1960s. Today, the district is struggling with numerous problems. Many of the almost 20,000 inhabitants are unemployed and suffer from poverty, the number of Hartz IV recipients is exorbitantly high. Around 50 percent of citizens have a migration background. The great idea of ​​the beautiful new living is with the decades, cautiously formulated, badly faded. That's often the case with once great ideas. Which brings us to German Social Democracy.

starting position

That the party now seeks a new leadership duo in a five-month process, is due to their extreme plight. That as many as seven teams and one individual candidate are available to vote and ultimately decide on the basis, as well. Only the literal struggle for survival has led the party to do everything differently.

Before the beginning of the 23 regional conferences the mockery was enormous. After the first four events, one must say: the malice was premature. The events work, they are entertaining, refreshing and even leave room for some content. And the base proves that this party is far more alive than its pale leaders last suspect. After Saarbrücken came 700 comrades, to Hanover 850, to Bernburg (Saale) came much more interested than chairs were present - in the Bürgerzentrum Neue Vahr also.

Current score

A serious prognosis about the outcome of the race can not be given. Fortunately, there are no representative surveys of the approximately 420,000 comrades with voting rights. So you can focus on the appearance and content of the applicants. That, too, makes things exciting and interesting.

The (very presumable) favorites

In the first four regional conferences, two teams have come to the fore that did not all count on the bill at the beginning. Michael Roth and Christina Kampmann are not only the youngest applicants in the field, they also present themselves as emphatically fresh and dynamic as if they were dealing with a casting show on ProSieben. For older comrades, their continuous well-being may be disturbing. Habitually, the SPD was, for a long time, chronically grumpy. But not only the younger ones obviously enjoy this new kind. Kampmann and Roth receive a lot of applause. In addition, they give the impression of really wanting to win. No other couple seems to prepare as gag-writer for the performances. Out come punchlines like: "The SPD is indeed the Claudio Pizarro of the party world" or "democracy is not a pizza delivery".

Mohssen Assanimoghaddam / dpa

Candidate duo Michael Roth and Christina Kampmann

The loudest applause received (also) in Bremen Karl Lauterbach for his hard-hitting rejection to the current federal government. "We have to get out of the Grand Coalition, we have no time to lose." Lauterbach and his competitor, the environmental expert Nina Scheer, are the only candidates who want to have the base voted on an immediate exit at the end of the year and want to give a clear exit recommendation. So they do not seem to hit a nerve in just a minority

Vice-Chancellor Olaf Scholz and application partner Klara Geywitz have to be on the bill as well as the Saxon State Minister for Integration, Petra Köpping, and Lower Saxony's Minister of the Interior Boris Pistorius. Both political couples are among the more conservative part of the applicant field. They seldom cause jubilation at the conferences. However, one can assume that their prominence, their impetuousness, and the inherent solidity embodied in it are appreciated by many members of the base. Few of you will visit even one of the 23 regional conferences.

Controversy of the party

Was also in Bremen the question of which team rather stay in the grand coalition and which they want to leave prematurely. Shortly after Lauterbach's clear rejection of the alliance, Boris Pistorius responded with a fine point. "We need a fantasy that goes beyond the question of whether or not to get out of the Grand Coalition a year earlier." This statement was well received in the audience. While Ralf Stegner stated that a party that defines itself through coalitions is making itself small, Olaf Scholz wants to make the whereabouts dependent on the upcoming negotiations on climate protection and ground rent. The K question will continue to shape the competition.

Short cash fall

All teams had great ideas for a fairer society on offer. However, the candidates did not want to spend much of their time with the counter-financing. If there had been a cash register in the hall, it would have been constantly formed. And in the end would have been a hundred billion bill bill.

Set of the day

Came by Ralf Stegner, who seems willing to side with Gesine Schwan so far, to get rid of his unofficial role as a symbol of social democratic misery. If Willy Brandt and Egon Bahr had only stared at the polls at that time, Stegner called to the comrades in Bremen, then the Ostpolitik of the 70s would never have existed. "You have to be passionate about what you think is important." For a long time democratically controlled social democracy this could be a key phrase.

Excitement of the game

Boris Pistorius was asked from the audience whether the state should continue to pay the costs of police operations around the matches of the Bundesliga. The city of Bremen wants to leave these security costs to the German Football League (DFL).

Pistorius does not believe in this idea. "I want to say very clearly: Football is not the milking cow of the nation," he said and was booed. Given the millions of profits in professional football, the sympathy of the comrades seemed to be limited.

Next game:

Monday evening in Friedberg (Hesse). Stadthalle. Kick-off: 18.30 clock.

Source: spiegel

All news articles on 2019-09-08

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