Friday 29 October 2021
“Now younger people should take it.”
Walter-Borjans wants to give up office as SPD leader
The SPD chairman Walter-Borjans does not want to be an SPD chairman in the future. He said in an interview that he will not apply again for the party chairmanship at the party congress on December 11th. He had achieved the goal for his time as part of the party leadership.
The SPD chairman Norbert Walter-Borjans does not want to apply again for the party chairmanship at the party conference on December 11th. This was confirmed by the politician of the “Rheinische Post”. Walter-Borjans has led the party since 2019 with Saskia Esken in a dual leadership. “For me, the chairmanship was not associated with any further career planning from the outset, but the goal of getting the party on course,” Walter-Borjans told the newspaper.
“With this mission, I have come so far that I can say: Now younger people should take it.” The politician has already initiated this: He has asked the board of his North Rhine-Westphalian state association to refrain from being nominated again.
He went with the “good feeling that he had helped shape the SPD for two years,” said Walter-Borjans in the “Rheinische Post”. “During this time we have shown that we can stick together and be successful with social democratic politics.” The newspaper quotes him as saying that the SPD is once again the leading figure in German politics after many years. The outgoing SPD leader said nothing about a desired successor.
But he is against the party leadership going into the new cabinet. “A member of the government as a party leader or party leader is necessarily always a piece of government spokesman,” Walter-Borjans told the newspaper. He prefers the previous division of labor, said the still party chairman. Because it has proven itself.