Saturday 30th October 2021
New Green Top
Who comes to Baerbock and Habeck?
The federal election has set a lot in motion in political Berlin. SPD leader Walter-Borjans has announced his withdrawal, Armin Laschet is CDU chairman on call. It will also be exciting with the Greens: They have a whole range of top jobs to fill.
The Greens are facing upheaval: around ten top posts are to be filled – party leadership, parliamentary group executive, probably four or five ministerial posts. There is little doubt that the previous party leaders Annalena Baerbock and Robert Habeck want to move into a new government with the SPD and FDP as ministers. According to the Greens statutes, they have to give up their posts. “Minister and party chairmanship is excluded,” said Habeck these days to the Phoenix broadcaster and announced board elections for January.
If you ask around about possible successors, you cannot ignore two names: Ricarda Lang and Omid Nouripour. You had “very successfully brought into play” for the new party leadership, says one party member. Another thinks the two are still exploring their chances of success.
The former top woman of the youth organization Green Youth and the foreign politician would cover a pleasant range as a duo, says a Green. Lang, a social politician from near Stuttgart, has just moved into the Bundestag for the first time at the age of 27 and belongs to the left wing of the party. The 46-year-old Nouripour, from Frankfurt with Iranian roots, has been in the Bundestag for 15 years and is an experienced foreign politician. The party rules dictate that at least one half of a green double head must be a woman. It is an unwritten law that the two wings, left and real, must be represented.
There are also greens who do not belong to any wing, but they are the exception – as was the election of Habeck and Baerbock in 2018, both of which were assigned to the Realo wing. Meanwhile, Lang / Nouripour are relishly silent about their possible ambitions. “My focus is currently on the coalition negotiations, the question of my future role is actually only for me afterwards,” she told the German press agency. He expressed himself with a dry “no comment”.
No talks about ministerial posts yet
Nothing is certain anyway. The greatest unknown is the allocation of the four or five ministerial posts. Habeck recently affirmed which party will take over which department. One Green argues that negotiations on content and ministerial competencies are easier to conduct if it is not yet clear who will ultimately hold what.
There are different versions of how the offices of the Greens are distributed internally. The ministerial offices in finance or a strengthened climate department would undoubtedly be top positions. The 52-year-old Habeck has the finance ministry firmly in view, but should also flirt with the interior ministry. The 40-year-old Baerbock as an energy politician would be a candidate for a powerful climate ministry. One thing is already clear: It will be tight for Realos, as at least two of the remaining ministerial posts would have to go to left-wing Greens. One of them could be the current co-parliamentary group leader Anton Hofreiter, for example as transport minister.
What will Cem Özdemir become?
Which raises the question of what will become of Cem Özdemir, who has long made no secret of his desire to govern and with 40 percent in his constituency of Stuttgart even got the best first vote result of the Greens nationwide. However, Özdemir also polarizes: The 55-year-old’s supporters argue that the party cannot do without the eloquent ex-party leader – critics, especially in the left wing, accuse him of doing his own thing too much.
The leadership of the parliamentary group, which after the election with the previous bosses Hofreiter and Kathrin Göring-Eckardt, initially only remained in office as a manager, will gain in importance. As part of the government majority, the Green MPs in the Bundestag will most likely have a say in the future course. The First Parliamentary Managing Director Britta Haßelmann was awarded excellent opportunities. The 59-year-old Realo politician has many years of experience in the Bundestag, has repeatedly worked with the FDP on opposition initiatives and is highly valued and popular in both wings. However, Haßelmann does not allow himself to be looked into the cards either: She is currently concentrating on the Bundestag and parliamentary group and the coalition negotiations, she said. “We’ll talk about who does what or who wants to do what at a later point in time.”