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Left Party Congress (archive)
Photo: Oliver Berg / dpa
Something strange is happening on the left: A change of power is imminent at the top of the party - and the otherwise argumentative comrades are pretty much in agreement this time.
Susanne Hennig-Wellsow and Janine Wissler should lead the left in the future.
At the party conference, which is now scheduled for the end of February after two postponements, the two are likely to be elected with a large majority.
That was basically already clear shortly after the two women declared their candidacy in September.
There was simply no one who wanted to take on the politicians.
So everything is fine?
Not quite.
Frustration spreads
For months there has been frustration among the comrades behind the scenes.
Above all in the camps that once set the tone in the party: the traditional links around Sahra Wagenknecht - and the reformers of parliamentary group leader Dietmar Bartsch.
The Wagenknecht left could not have a say in the leadership question.
The Bartsch reformers would have loved to see the parliamentary director Jan Korte at the top of the party.
But he waved him off with thanks.
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Left chairperson designate: Susanne Hennig-Wellsow, Janine Wissler
Photo: Frank May / dpa
Since then, both groups have been struggling to play a relevant role in the future board.
But Hennig-Wellsow in particular has so far made little effort to involve the old power blocs beyond a minimum.
Most recently, Bartsch confidants spoke to the Thuringian state chairman in December.
There was no communication.
Open confrontation
All of this has serious consequences for peace within the party.
The Bartsch reformers are now looking for open confrontation at the party congress.
The result is a kind of intra-party proxy war.
Because the fight for influence is not fought in row one - but behind it.
It is about the post of Federal Managing Director that Jörg Schindler has held so far.
According to Hennig-Wellsow and Wissler, it should stay that way.
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Candidate as federal manager of the Left: Thomas Westphal
But now it is clear: there will be a candidate for battle at the party congress.
Thomas Westphal, a Bartsch confidante, competes against Schindler.
"Yes, I'm running," Westphal told SPIEGEL.
“We recently stayed below our possibilities.
I want to help change that. "
Experienced networker
Westphal has headed the executive office in the parliamentary group since 2016.
He is considered an experienced networker, a man in the comrades' engine room.
Should he win, he will also want to work internally in the future.
"We have to listen more, take criticism seriously, and be present on site," says Westphal.
"It's about important carer work and better communication."
Westphal's candidacy is on the one hand an expression of great dissatisfaction with Schindler in parts of the party.
The current federal managing director has been under massive criticism since the 2019 European elections at the latest.
Back then, after a profile-watered election campaign, the left landed with a disastrous 5.5 percent of the vote.
Westphal says: "We have never really dealt with this result and also defeats in state elections."
Shifts in power politics
On the other hand, the forthcoming candidacy for a fight is a direct result of the shifts in power politics that have taken place among the left in recent years.
In addition to Wagenknecht leftists and Bartsch reformers, both a new left and another pragmatic group have established themselves and have taken the lead in the party.
It was these camps that gathered behind the outgoing chairmen Katja Kipping and Bernd Riexinger - and that now also support Hennig-Wellsow and Wissler.
Quarreled leadership: Ex-parliamentary group leader Sahra Wagenknecht and still-group leader Dietmar Bartsch with the two party leaders Katja Kipping and Bernd Riexinger
Photo: Britta Pedersen / DPA
The background for the split between party links and realos were, among other things, Wagenknecht's cross-shots in refugee policy - and the fact that Bartsch stuck to her anyway.
In addition, a dispute over the future course of the party fuels the differences to this day: While the traditional reformers and left-wing comrades tend to focus on the classic left-wing clientele, i.e. low-wage earners and the unemployed, their opponents want to sharpen the party's ecological and socially liberal profile.
Deep trenches
In parts of the party there is an increasing need to break up the Bartsch-Wagenknecht alliance and permanently disempower it.
Among Hennig-Wellsow supporters, it was recently said more often that a directional decision had to be brought about at the party congress.
As early as autumn, the left had speculated about a candidacy for the federal executive position.
But then the comrades postponed their party convention to February due to the pandemic.
In the Bartsch camp, too, initially the opinion prevailed that it would be unreasonable to replace the campaign manager at this late stage.
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Acting Left Federal Managing Director Jörger Schindler
Photo: Christophe Gateau / dpa
The fact that the matter is now escalating shows once again how deep the rifts are.
Most recently, according to reports, Bartsch confidants had spoken to Hennig-Wellsow again in December.
Obviously, an amicable solution was not possible.
Despite everything, Westphal does not want to see himself as an instrument of power politics.
"I see my candidacy as an offer to the comrades," says Westphal.
“The election campaign ends with a wing dispute.
And of course the chairperson-elect have my full support. "
"Lafodödel" list
How Westphal's chances are is completely unclear.
In 2018, Jörg Schindler prevailed against his former opponent with a wafer-thin majority.
Westphal, on the other hand, is also supported by traditional leftists, for which he has critics in the pragmatist camp.
Some comrades accuse him of being apolitical.
And then there's the list thing.
In 2012 Westphal, who at the time was still working for the party in the Karl-Liebknecht-Haus, prepared an overview of the party executive on behalf of the then parliamentary group vice-president Bartsch.
Westphal sorted the members of the committee according to party affiliation.
The categories: "Z" for reliable, "U" for independent, and "L" for Lafontaine - or "Lafodödel", as it was noted at one point.
Westphal does not want to have written this corruption for the supporters of ex-party leader Oskar Lafontaine, at that time still a leading figure in the left camp.
Still, when the matter was discovered later, many comrades resented him.
Even today?
Westphal prefers not to comment on the subject.
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