The FDP, the Left and the Greens are taking legal action before the Federal Constitutional Court.
The new electoral law is to be stopped before the general election.
Berlin - The
three opposition factions FDP, Left and Greens
filed a complaint
with the
Federal Constitutional Court
on February 1st
to stop
the new
right to vote
.
The new regulation was decided in October.
The FDP parliamentary director Marco Buschmann explained the background to the lawsuit: The grand coalition is practicing “political self-service” with the law.
The three political groups also applied for
temporary legal protection
.
When Karlsruhe will decide is still open.
The FDP, the Left and the Greens see the Union benefit from voting rights
At the
center of the opposition criticism
is the regulation contained in the law that
three overhang seats will not be compensated in future
.
The
Union
in particular will
benefit from this
, complain the FDP, the Left and the Greens.
The law also creates no legal clarity, said the Green Parliamentary Secretary Britta Haßelmann.
“Such an
arbitrariness
must not be approved.” In addition, the three parliamentary groups fear that the new regulation will in no way
serve
the
goal of downsizing parliament
.
In this respect, the law is a "proverbial sham," said the Left MP Friedrich Straetmanns.
With the
new law
, further
overhang mandates are to be offset to a limited extent with list mandates from the same party in other federal states
.
The aim of the reform is to avoid excessive enlargement of the Bundestag through overhang and equalization mandates.
For future elections from 2024 onwards, the number of constituencies is
to be reduced from 299 to 280
, which should reduce the number of overhang seats.
These arise when a party receives more direct mandates than it would be entitled to based on its second share of the vote.
Suffrage lawsuit by the FDP, the Left and the Greens - decision before the federal election?
The three opposition factions had
already presented their own draft reform last year
, but were unable to prevail against the governing
parties
.
The FDP, the Left and the Greens now hope that the Federal Constitutional Court will
decide on the lawsuit
before the general election on September 26th
.
The representative of the three parliamentary groups, Sophie Schönberger, pointed out that the disputed regulation was not about the election itself, but about the subsequent
allocation of mandates
.
Therefore, the court could make a decision relatively shortly before the election on September 26th.
Should Karlsruhe overturn the new electoral law, the old regulation would apply again until a new one is decided.
(dpa / jh)