As of: January 29, 2024, 4:56 a.m
By: Jens Kiffmeier, Christine Dankbar, Nils Hinsberger
Comments
Press
Split
Sahra Wagenknecht's party invites you to the first party conference in Berlin.
The program and candidates for the European elections will be presented there.
All information in the live ticker.
De Masi
at the
party conference
: As a member of the BSW, Fabio De Masi also speaks and addresses the federal government
Pension topic at BSW party conference: Wagenknecht condemns traffic lights and shoots Ricarda Lang
Update from January 28th, 10:15 a.m.:
The Alliance for Sahra Wagenknecht (BSW) received a large donation from Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania after its party conference.
Two married couples from West Mecklenburg said they donated one million euros to the new party.
The editorial network Germany (RND) quoted the couple as saying that it was primarily the party's peace policy that motivated the couple to donate.
For the donors who, according to the report, made their fortune in the high-tech industry, the Wagenknecht party should have the same starting chances for the coming elections as other established parties.
Sahra Wagenknecht and her husband Oskar Lafontaine are happy about a million-dollar donation after their party conference.
© Kay Nietfeld/dpa
After the BSW party conference: Maaßen expressed skepticism about working with Wagenknecht
Update from January 28th, 6:16 a.m.:
After the end of the BSW party conference, the Values Union chairman Hans-Georg Maaßen expressed skepticism about a possible collaboration with the Alliance Sahra Wagenknecht (BSW).
“The similarities are that Ms. Wagenknecht addresses and expresses the problems that I also see.
On the other hand, their solutions (...) are from the socialist toolbox,” said the former Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution to the
dpa
news agency .
Maaßen emphasized that he was open to working with the BSW, but had doubts as to whether it would be willing to do so.
He appreciates Wagenknecht as a talented politician.
But he added: “What I don’t like about her is: she’s just a communist.”
BSW party conference: Oskar Lafontaine receives a standing ovation from the Wagenknecht party
Update from January 27th, 7:00 p.m
.: Oskar Lafontaine speaks an hour and a half earlier than planned, and the members also stand up beforehand to applaud.
He is modest.
He didn't want to push himself forward at all.
But since no one had come forward to give the final word, it was said that he could do it.
“And my wife also said you could do it. And since the Saarlander is always under the thumb, I’m here now.”
Many told him that this was already his third party.
“It’s the last one now,” says Lafontaine.
Parties are associations that come together behind a program.
If these principles were abandoned, then one could not stay.
“We are now in this situation again.” There is a real gap in the party system “and Sahra Wagenknecht’s party will fill this gap.” This is also because there is no longer a party in the Bundestag that advocates disarmament and peace : “No, everyone is for war and militarization!” shouts Lafontaine.
Party member Oskar Lafontaine at the lectern at the first BSW party conference.
© Chris Emil Janssen/IMAGO
My news
Russia reacts to major NATO maneuvers – and threatens “tragic consequences” read
Baerbock hits the Union with the K question at a carnival event - “... and get Söder” read
If Russia wins: Hungarian right-wing extremist wants to annex Ukrainian territories read
Russians are advancing on several sectors of the front: Putin's goal is becoming more and more concrete
Two in one fell swoop: Ukrainian drones take out Russian tanks read
New survey hammer: Wagenknecht party swallows the traffic lights in the east
The BSW also wants to reverse a large part of the social cuts.
There must be “proper unemployment benefits” and lower energy prices for everyone, including the economy.
To do this, we have to “obtain energy directly from Russia” again.
He considers the fact that the BSW is certified to be open to the law to be a “proof of intellectual inexperience”.
He rails against gender language and cancel culture, but his main concern is peace.
According to Lafontaine, the guiding principle of German culture must be: “Never again war!” This was what the six million Jews murdered in the Holocaust warned.
But the deaths of 27 million Soviet citizens in the Second World War are also a reminder for peace.
But the “idiots” from the traffic light parties like Anton Hofreiter, Michael Roth and Marie-Agnes Strack-Zimmermann, who now also wanted to deliver weapons to Ukraine that would have a reach as far as Moscow, would not have understood this.
The BSW therefore has a big task, Lafontaine concludes.
In addition to advocating for better social benefits, it reads: “War should never again come from German soil!” The members thank him with standing and rhythmic applause.
No comrades at the BSW party conference
Update from January 27th, 5:50 p.m
.: Incidentally, the salutation “dear comrades” was taboo.
At the delegates' meeting the evening before, the phrase “dear friends” was agreed upon.
Optionally also “dear colleagues”.
But the latter tends not to prevail.
During the conversations in the foyer, the comrade address slips into one or another conversation.
Update from January 27th, 4:55 p.m
.: The party conference has ended, completely without discussions.
The members who ran for the party executive committee do not have to answer any questions, especially not critical ones.
Now the list for the European elections is being drawn up seamlessly.
Top candidate Fabio De Masi foregoes his introductory speech.
His election is considered certain anyway.
There is no opposing candidacy.
Incidentally, not on the other list places either.
BSW elects party executive board and arbitration commission
Update from January 27th, 4:20 p.m
.: Sahra Wagenknecht's party has now also elected an expanded party executive board and its arbitration commission.
The distribution between men and women doesn't look any better here either.
Of the 14 places on the expanded party executive committee, only two were filled by women.
The three places on the arbitration committee are also dominated by men - one place goes to a woman.
Wagenknecht, MdB and Amira Mohamed Ali, MdB at the 1st party conference Sahra Wagenknecht - Reason and Justice in the Cosmos Cinema in Berlin © IMAGO/Political-Moments
Update from January 27th, 4 p.m
.: The political scientist Hajo Funke is also there.
He had a long, confidential conversation with Oskar Lafontaine on the sidelines of the party conference.
Funke attests that the new party has the potential to make a difference in the German party landscape.
She is competent when it comes to social policy - and her appointment could prevent the AfD from becoming the strongest party in Thuringia and Saxony.
But that's not certain, he says.
BSW party executive elected
Update from January 27th, 3:30 p.m
.: The party executive committee has now been elected: 17 of the 22 members are men.
When you talk to the delegates about the few women, they point to the female party leadership with Sahra Wagenknecht and Amira Mohamed Ali.
Just as the CDU once said: We have Merkel, we don't need a quota for women.
One member says that at the preliminary meeting in the evening someone wanted to propose that there should be a party leadership with equal gender representation.
But it was just a joke.
De Masi speaks at the BSW party conference: “Thumb screws” for the powerful
Update from January 27th, 3:10 p.m
.: Prominent appearance at the BSW party conference: Fabio De Masi, the ex-leftist and former member of the Bundestag, first emphasizes his role in the cum-ex scandal surrounding Olaf Scholz on stage.
Then it goes against the “Big Tech” companies from the USA.
The Sahra Wagenknecht alliance wants to “take on the powerful”.
In order to take action against tax havens and the influence of large corporations in Europe, you have to apply “thumb screws”.
De Masi also deals well against the traffic light coalition.
Through mismanagement and sticking to the debt brake, the “so-called progress coalition” would miss out on important investments in infrastructure and necessary climate measures.
“It’s not ecological, it’s stupid,” says De Masi.
He also wants to place less of a burden on “normal” citizens and ask the super-rich to pay.
The attitude of the traffic light in the Ukraine war is also worthy of criticism.
“Where were the loudmouths” when it came to the involvement of oligarchs in the Wirecard scandal, asks De Masi.
Wagenknecht is looking forward to the opportunity to speak in the Bundestag
Fabio De Masi, candidate for the European Parliament, speaks at the founding party conference of the new Wagenknecht party, the “Alliance Sahra Wagenknecht - for Reason and Justice”.
© Kay Nietfeld/picture alliance/dpa
Update from January 27th, 2:50 p.m
.: Now the members of the Bundestag are called to the stage.
The ten MPs who ended the Left faction in the Bundestag by leaving the party.
“Thank you for taking part,” says the conference president.
Sahra Wagenknecht is happy that she is “finally allowed to speak in the Bundestag again”.
You can literally imagine some leftists writhing in pain in front of the television.
Where are the women of the party executive at BSW?
Update from January 27th, 2:10 p.m
.: The party leaders will be presented at the Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance party conference.
Including the candidates for the party executive committee.
10 candidates have already introduced themselves.
There seems to be a certain trend among the delegates: of the 10 possible party leaders, only one is a woman.
There is now a break at the party conference itself.
In the foyer of the Kosmos, Fabian Köster from the today show does fun interviews with the delegates.
This culminates in a group photo that looks a bit like a coffee trip.
It's because most delegates are so-called best-agers.
During Sahra Wagenknecht's speech, the today's show team sat outside the hall and took a break.
For Wagenknecht, Ricarda Lang is a “symbol of the aloofness” of the traffic light
Update from January 27th, 1:30 p.m
.: Wagenknecht also addressed the situation of what she called the “hard-working population” in her speech.
There is no longer any talk about the fact that people who are no longer able to do their job due to illness will become impoverished.
She also calls for a move away from the pressure on young people and advocates for more motivation.
She leaves out what those should be.
“Spoiled young politicians without a degree” who would cut funding for necessary further training are also a problem.
The 54-year-old also shot at Green Party federal chair Ricarda Lang (Greens) during her speech.
She made a “mistake” when she completely misjudged the average pension in Germany to be 2,000 euros.
“That is the symbol of this aloofness,” emphasizes Wagenknecht.
“Berlin Bubble” strongly represented at BSW
Update from January 27th, 1:00 p.m
.: Not because of a departure from the Berlin bubble: The delegates from the capital make up the second largest group with 53 members.
Most come from North Rhine-Westphalia (73), the smallest group from Bremen (7).
Delegates from all federal states arrived.
Their number is identical to the party members of the respective country, as the BSW has only granted membership to around 450 people.
The goal is to grow in a controlled manner.
Hypocrite: Sahra Wagenknecht rails against the traffic light government at the party conference
Sahra Wagenknecht, MdB during her speech at the 1st party conference of the Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance - Reason and Justice in the Kosmos Cinema in Berlin.
© IMAGO / Political Moments
Update from January 27th, 12:45 p.m
.: Sahra Wagenknecht launches an all-round attack at the party conference of her new alliance.
The success of the AfD, which, according to Wagenknecht, includes Nazis and right-wing extremists, is “not the result of brilliant work by the AfD,” but rather a failure of the traffic light coalition.
According to Wagenknecht, the “dumbest government in Europe”.
The fact that federal government politicians are now taking to the streets against the right is “hypocrisy”.
She suggests that citizens demonstrate for social improvements and new elections - and of course for an end to the sanctions against Russia.
According to Wagenknecht, this requires “mass demonstrations”.
But she doesn't see a real alternative either, because Merz is not the "lesser evil" because of his pension policy and willingness to deliver Taurus cruise missiles to Ukraine.
“Anti-racism and anti-fascism” at the BSW party conference
Update January 27th, 11:30 a.m.:
At the start of the first federal party conference of the Alliance Sahra Wagenknecht, the writer Daniela Dahn recalled the liberation of the Nazi death camp Auschwitz 79 years ago.
Party founder Sahra Wagenknecht asked her to speak about it, said Dahn in Berlin.
“This party conference unmistakably shows the commitment to anti-racism and anti-fascism,” said the writer as the first speaker at the Berlin Kino Kosmos.
Unfortunately, the strong wish that all Germans would have learned from history forever had not been fulfilled, she added.
“The womb is still fertile.” Dahn recalled the great sacrifices of the Red Army of the Soviet Union in the fight against National Socialist Germany and in the liberation of the concentration camp.
Alliance Sahra Wagenknecht: The start is delayed
Update from January 27th, 10:30 a.m.:
The party conference opened with some delay.
The reason: Photographers didn't want to leave the stage where the Wagenknecht/Lafontaine couple had sat down.
Update from January 27th, 9:50 a.m.:
Left chairwoman Janine Wissler has accused the newly founded Alliance Sahra Wagenknecht (BSW) party of representing an “agenda open to the right”.
Wissler referred in
the Stuttgarter Zeitung
and
Stuttgarter Nachrichten
(Saturday editions) to a “rejection of the individual right to asylum, the spread of conspiracy theories and the cozying up to dictators” by the BSW, from Russian President Vladimir Putin to Syrian ruler Bashar al-Assad.
To combat the shift to the right in Germany, “there is no need for another party that competes with the right-wing original for voters, but rather a modern justice party,” Wissler told the newspapers.
Programmatically, the BSW is “a hodgepodge of everything, but certainly not a social alternative”.
In addition, the new party was “more like a personality cult than a democratic party,” criticized Wissler.
A “small circle of egomaniacs around Wagenknecht” seems to be setting the tone there.
Alliance Wagenknecht (BSW) party conference: program for the European elections is presented
Update from January 27th, 6:00 a.m.:
The Alliance Sahra Wagenknecht (BSW) party is meeting on Saturday (10:00 a.m.) in Berlin for its first party conference.
At the one-day event, the party executive committee will first be elected, with Sahra Wagenknecht and the former Left parliamentary group leader Amira Mohamed Ali taking over the chairmanship.
In the afternoon (from 2 p.m.) the newly founded party wants to decide on its program for the European elections on June 9th and draw up its European list.
The draft program is characterized by sharp criticism of the European Union (EU) in its current form; among other things, the BSW wants more decision-making power for the nation states.
Other demands include an end to arms aid for Ukraine, the purchase of oil and gas from Russia and asylum procedures at external borders and in third countries.
The top candidates are financial politician Fabio De Masi and the former SPD mayor of Düsseldorf, Thomas Geisel.
First party conference of Alliance Wagenknecht: Lafontaine announces in advance that he will join the party
Berlin – Sahra Wagenknecht’s husband recently announced that he was joining the BSW.
“Of course I am a member of the BSW,” he told the
Saarbrücker Zeitung
.
The former Saarland Left chairman is expected to speak at the party conference on Saturday.
In addition to Lafontaine, co-party leader Amira Mohamed Ali and top candidate for the European elections Fabio De Masi are also scheduled to take part in the party conference.
Lafontaine and Wagenknecht officially announced that they were a couple in 2011.
They finally got married in 2014.
Lafontaine can look back on a long career in the SPD and the Left, which he co-founded after a falling out with former Chancellor Schröder (SPD).
Under Schröder he was also finance minister for the SPD from 1998 to 1999.
Alliance Sahra Wagenknecht wants to present the party program
“For reason and justice” – that is the addition that the alliance around the ex-leftist Sahra Wagenknecht has written in its name.
So far, so meaningless.
The party's first programmatic points on its website are economic reason, social justice, peace and freedom.
The aim is for an “innovative economy with fair competition, well-paid, secure jobs, a high proportion of industrial value creation, a fair tax system and a strong middle class”.
Instead of “excessive sanctions,” the alliance wants to rely on “as many partners as possible” in its foreign policy.
The party wants to appeal to left-wing and conservative voters with its ideas.
At least according to surveys, that seems to be working.
Infratest Dimap
on behalf of the
MDR
sees the party at up to 8 percent in individual federal states.
Der Spiegel suspects that the alliance could become a real competitor to the AfD.
It remains to be seen how the party will position itself programmatically.
“Unlike other parties, we want to develop the program together with those who are affected by the problems in the country in their everyday lives,” said Wagenknecht.
A program and the candidates for the European elections will be presented at the party conference.
(with agency material)