Luigi Pantisano, the designated co-chair of the Left Party, has called Friedrich Merz (CDU) a “failure” and accused the CDU of pursuing “fascist policies.” In an interview with the Bild newspaper on Friday at the Left Party congress in Potsdam, the 46-year-old MP said: “Ultimately, there is currently no difference between the CDU, which is pursuing fascist policies, the AfD, or the fascists themselves.”
Pantisano is seeking election at the party congress as the successor to Jan van Aken, who is stepping down for health reasons. He is to lead the party together with current co-chair Ines Schwerdtner. Schwerdtner announced tough confrontations with the AfD and told dpa: “We will not leave the East to the Nazis.” She also sharply criticized the black-red coalition under Merz: “Merz is taking a chainsaw to our pensions, our health, our working hours, our education.”
The background to the debate is the upcoming state elections in Saxony-Anhalt, Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, and Berlin. The AfD is leading in polls; in Magdeburg, it hopes to win the post of minister-president. The CDU has so far rejected any cooperation with the Left Party, but without the AfD, majorities could be hard to find. According to the “Politbarometer” by ZDF and Tagesspiegel, a majority of 57 percent of respondents consider it wrong for the CDU to maintain its incompatibility resolution toward the Left Party.
Source: www.tagesspiegel.de
