The left secured 4.9 percent of the vote in the federal election.
Actually too little to move into the Bundestag.
But the party can invoke a special rule.
Berlin - Actually it wasn't enough for the left. 4.9 percent of Germans voted for the left in the Bundestag election. In order for a party to be allowed to move into the Bundestag, however, it must be at least five percent. It is thanks to three party members that the so-called “blocking clause” does not apply to the left: Sören Pellmann (Leipzig), Gregor Gysi and Gesine Lötzsch (both Berlin) won their constituencies and secured three direct seats. The so-called basic mandate clause allows parties to move into the Bundestag if these three direct mandates secure themselves - even if the second vote is less than five percent. The chairmen Susanne Henning-Wellsow and Janine Wissler as well as parliamentary group leader Dietmar Bartsch could not win any of their constituencies.
For the left, 39 members will sit in the Bundestag in future, as not only will the three directly elected left-wing politicians move in, but the election result of 4.9 percent will also be reflected in the distribution of seats.
Nevertheless: For the left, the election result is a "heavy blow", as co-chair Susanne Henning-Wellsow admitted the day after.
Bundestag election: Left has to take bitter loss - "Painful losses"
In the 2017 federal election, the left still received 9.2 percent of the second vote. Co-chair Janine Wissler described the fact that the party now failed at the five percent hurdle as a “deep cut”. The party must be "reorganized". Left-wing top politician Dietmar Bartsch was also disappointed after the election defeat. The party failed to appear unanimously. The smallest party in the German Bundestag has high goals for the coming legislative period: "We want to be the social conscience in the next Bundestag," emphasized Bartsch.
It remains to be seen whether the quarrels with the former left parliamentary group leader Sahra Wagenknecht can be resolved.
In the past, two party expulsion proceedings had been initiated against Wagenknecht.
The left argued that the former co-party leader had done serious damage to the party with her book The Self-Righteous.
With or without Sahra Wagenknecht: According to the party leaders, the left is facing a radical change.
Susanne Henning-Wellsow and Janine Wissler still want to keep their posts.
