Member selection: Chancellor Scholz: Franziska Giffey the judges for Berlin
MP selection
Chancellor Scholz: Franziska Giffey the judges for Berlin
The SPD started the hot phase of the election campaign. The Federal Chancellor also comes to support. And he praises the SPD state leader for her housing policy as well as for dealing with the New Year’s Eve riots.
Five weeks before the repetition of the parliamentary elections in Berlin, Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) gave the state SPD courage for the election campaign. The governing mayor and SPD state chairwoman Franziska Giffey had invited the prominent comrade, with whom she sat at the cabinet table as a former family minister when Scholz was still federal finance minister, to the Varieté Wintergarten for Monday evening. Scholz came and praised Giffey’s politics several times at the so-called campaign kickoff.
It’s annoying that the selection of MPs has to be repeated, he said. But it is also an opportunity for the party to improve on the good election result of 2021 – at that time the party came in first place ahead of the Greens and the CDU. He is firmly convinced that the Berlin SPD will win the election again. Franziska Giffey is the right person for this.
He himself knows from his time as mayor in Hamburg that the consequences of some decisions can only be seen years later. That also applies to Berlin. He also certified that the Governing Mayor of Berlin was pursuing the right approach when it came to housing construction. If there is a housing shortage, there is no other way than to build more apartments, said Scholz. “We’re not going to stop doing this.” However, this will take longer.
In the opinion of the Chancellor, Giffey is also doing a lot right when dealing with the riots on New Year’s Eve with attacks on the police and fire brigade: It is important that everything is done to clarify the incidents. “And of course you should never sugarcoat everything that takes place there,” said Scholz. That didn’t happen in Berlin either.
Regarding the current discussion about the consequences after the New Year’s Eve riots, he said: “I think it’s very good that you make sure that the police are well equipped, that you make sure that the right laws exist.” Giffey and Interior Senator Iris Spranger (SPD) had discussed, among other things, more bodycams for the police and fire brigade and a tightening of gun laws.
SPD General Secretary Kevin Kühnert said that a strong Berlin SPD is also important for the traffic light government in the federal government. The repetition of the selection of MPs also involves the question of whether Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) still has strong SPD federal states behind him, said Kühnert. It depends on whether Scholz and the federal government could do the best job.
Giffey himself defended himself against renewed general criticism from the Union after the New Year’s Eve riots. “145 chaotic people don’t mean that 3.7 million people are idiots,” she said, referring to the 145 arrests during New Year’s Eve. There have also been attacks on rescue services in other German cities, according to the SPD state chairmen. They also wonder how attacks on police officers elsewhere can be explained, in which “Sieg Heil” calls could be heard.
She accused the Bavarian Prime Minister Markus Söder (CSU) of criticizing Berlin unjustifiably. “I haven’t heard where the solutions are,” she said. “There is no simple solution, it is more complex.” It doesn’t help if prime ministers give each other orders. After the events of New Year’s Eve, Söder said, among other things, that Berlin was developing into a city of chaos.
After the attacks on the police and fire brigade, Giffey, but also the entire red-green-red Senate, is under criticism. The September 2021 parliamentary elections are scheduled to be repeated in Berlin on February 12. It was declared invalid by the state constitutional court in mid-November due to numerous glitches and “severe systemic errors”.
SPD candidates for the House of Representatives election