German far-left’s top EU candidate vows to fight ‘climate apartheid’

1 year ago 32

Migration activist Carola Rackete has vowed to fight “climate apartheid” after the far-left Die Linke party formally selected her and GUE/NGL leader Martin Schirdewan on Saturday to be the party’s top candidates alongside MEP Özlem Demirel in next year’s EU elections.

The choice of top candidate was confirmed by Die Linke delegates at the party’s annual conference in Augsburg after Rackete was nominated by the party’s leadership in July.

“We’re facing a choice in Europe: human rights or white supremacy; climate justice or climate apartheid; a good life for everyone or the return of fascism,” she told the party conference, adding that climate change is a “social crisis” that exacerbates social disparities.

Die Linke is the only party that combines social and green policies, she said, adding that it was now regrouping after the departure of prominent MP Sahra Wagenknecht, who founded a rival outfit.

Rackete, who is not a party member, rose to prominence in 2019 as a ship captain rescuing migrants in the Mediterranean. She famously clashed with Italian far-right leader and then interior minister Matteo Salvini when she docked her ship in an Italian port against his orders.

“Best wishes, long live democracy,” Salvini said ironically on X in response to her nomination in July. Die Linke co-leader Janine Wissler added fuel to the fire at the party’s manifesto launch when she said the party wanted to challenge the “Italian government and the fascist forces there”.

With Rackete’s candidacy, the leadership wants to redefine Die Linke’s identity as “opening up to activists” from green and social movements, as Wissler previously put it.

The party’s draft EU election manifesto embraces a mix of topical left-wing demands regarding radical, anti-capitalist redistribution and climate policy.

A new beginning?

Die Linke’s ‘shift towards greener policies’ is also the result of Wagenknecht’s departure, who has been a vocal critic of green policies. Her new alliance, Sahra Wagenknecht (BSW), was launched in November and aims to contest the EU elections on a more socially conservative platform.

While the Die Linke leadership claims that the split has reunited the party, it appears it could lose its parliamentary standing as a result.

Since Die Linke has decided to expel all the renegade MPs from its parliamentary group in the Bundestag in two weeks, it will lose its parliamentary group status and the financial and representational privileges that go with it. If the party fails to surpass its current polling of 4%, it will not receive any seats in the Bundestag at the next general election due to an electoral threshold.

Contrary to earlier predictions, however, Die Linke has not lost much support to the BSW and has a fair chance of retaining its five seats in the European elections, as indicative polls that include the new alliance have shown. Die Linke would thus remain an essential pillar of the GUE/NGL group in the EU Parliament.

The BSW remains attractive mainly to conservative voters, according to a poll published on Friday and commissioned by the Institute for Critical Social Analysis, a research organisation affiliated with Die Linke.

“The voter potential of the two parties [Die Linke and BSW] overlap much less than expected,” the institute’s chairman, Mario Candeias, wrote.