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Sahra Wagenknecht in May 2020
Photo: Eventpress Stauffenberg / imago images
The left-wing politician Sahra Wagenknecht has been nominated again as the top candidate of the NRW left for the Bundestag despite fierce internal party criticism of her new book.
In a battle vote for first place in the assembly meeting in Essen, she received 127 votes, as the meeting management announced.
That corresponds to 61 percent.
After the votes on the places, the entire list has to be elected by the representatives.
Wagenknecht surprisingly had two opposing candidates when applying for the top spot in North Rhine-Westphalia.
Only one competitor was previously known.
A young climate activist, who surprisingly also ran, sharply criticized Wagenknecht.
A request to hold a one-hour debate and thus add to the agenda was initially rejected by a majority.
Questions were drawn that the three applicants had to ask themselves.
General settlement with the party
The former parliamentary group leader of the Left in the Bundestag again fought against the violent criticism.
"My book doesn't do the accounting with the left," she said when applying for the top spot.
Your book is a proposal for a stronger left.
What does not work is that quotations that have been taken out of context and sometimes also falsified are conveying a distorted image of your new book.
One shouldn't treat one another like that, emphasized Wagenknecht in Essen.
more on the subject
Sahra Wagenknecht on the private home debate: "I don't want us to end up like the USA" An interview by Kevin Hagen and Jonas Schaible
Dispute over Bundestag candidacy: First left-wing leaders demand Wagenknecht's withdrawal from Timo Lehmann
As SPIEGEL reported on Friday, citing members of the party executive, several left-wing politicians called on Wagenknecht to renounce their renewed Bundestag candidacy immediately before the NRW assembly (read more here).
According to the report, several members of the party executive, including the left-wing member of the Bundestag, Niema Movassat, see the book "The Self-Righteous" as a kind of general settlement with the party.
jme / dpa