Buchner for an objective view of election problems

Created: 09/25/2022Updated: 09/25/2022 15:48

SPD politician Dennis Buchner at a press event in the House of Representatives.

© Paul Zinken/dpa/archive image

Tension is growing in Berlin: Does the House of Representatives election have to be repeated?

Before the oral hearing of the Constitutional Court, Parliament President Buchner opposes too much scandal.

Berlin - One year after the elections in Berlin, the President of the Berlin House of Representatives, Dennis Buchner, called for an objective analysis of the breakdowns and organizational problems that had occurred at the time.

"In my view, not everything that happened can be scandalized," said the SPD politician of the German Press Agency.

"In the vast majority of cases, it's simply a matter of the fact that the act of voting ended later.

And if you are still in line at 6 p.m. and then you are still allowed to vote, then for me that is something that is unjustly scandalized.” Especially since the queues in front of the polling stations also had to do with the fact that the corona pandemic distance was observed and fewer ballot boxes were set up.

On September 26, 2021, Berliners were called to four votes: the elections to the Bundestag, the House of Representatives and the district parliaments, as well as a referendum on the expropriation of large housing groups.

Massive problems had arisen: These included incorrect or missing ballots, the temporary closure of polling stations and long queues in front of them, sometimes with waiting times of hours.

In addition, some of the 2,257 polling stations were open long after 6 p.m.

This Wednesday, the Berlin Constitutional Court will hold a public session on objections to the assessment of the elections to the House of Representatives.

It is possible that the election will have to be repeated in at least some of the 78 constituencies.

The court is expected to make a decision later this year.

According to Buchner's assessment, two points are particularly important according to the court's specifications: "One is proportionality, the other is the point of mandate relevance." This is about whether electoral errors affect the composition of the House of Representatives and the mandates.

Buchner referred to the highest turnout since 1990 of 75.4 percent and around 1.85 million votes cast.

“If I take out the allegations of long queues or waiting times due to missing ballot papers and look at the errors that actually happened, such as incorrectly issued ballot papers that had to be declared invalid, then we’re talking about around 1,600 votes.

This number is actually relatively small compared to the 1.85 million votes cast.

We shouldn't completely forget that when we talk about proportionality.

"Then in the end, the question that is decisive for me is whether it has any relevance to the composition of this parliament or to the question of who sits in this parliament.

And the court will have to answer that,” Buchner continued.

"In my view, the number of votes cast incorrectly and therefore considered invalid is too small to really be relevant to the question of the composition of Parliament, i.e. the second votes."

The court will have to look again at the question of whether the first votes in some constituencies were so tight that the right MP might not be sitting in parliament.

His assessment here, too, is: "I think there is very little relevance to the mandate."

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Against this background, according to Buchner's assessment, it could even be that the constitutional court does not order a repetition at all.

"Everything is conceivable in court: new elections, partial by-elections, but also that in the end no mandate relevance for the entire parliament is recognized," said the politician.

In his view, the actual errors are limited to a small proportion of polling stations.

"The court has to decide, do you let them vote again, or do you let them say, we learn from this election, we learn from the mishaps, we change something, but we also accept that this election result is at least 99.9 percent came about lawfully.”

According to Buchner, he must also represent the rights of MPs who were elected in constituencies where there were no electoral glitches and where there were large gaps in voting.

"In the end, there must also be reliability for the MPs who have been elected to be able to exercise their mandate."

In general, Buchner emphasized that the mistakes from back then should not be repeated.

He therefore thinks it is right that the Senate has initiated structural and organizational reforms on the basis of a recommendation from an expert commission.

According to Buchner, he could not see that democracy had been damaged by the events on election day.

"There was no damage to democracy, but it is grist for the mill of those who always claim that Berlin is not well organized." dpa