German politician Sarah Wagenknecht created a new party

German politician Sarah Wagenknecht will leave the ranks of the Left Party and create her own party “For Sanity and Justice”. The corresponding statement was made at a conference in Berlin, broadcast by the N-TV channel. A full-fledged party will be created in 2024, and for now Wagenknecht will lead a political union of 10 politicians who left the Left. Based on Sarah Wagenknecht’s initials, the union will be called BSW – Fuer Vernunft und Gerechtigkeit, “For Sanity and Justice.” The former head of the Left faction in the Bundestag, Amir Mohammed Ali, was elected its chairman.

According to Wagenknecht, she created a new party because most existing political forces do not actually represent the interests of Germans. Because of this, the electorate becomes desperate and begins to vote for the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD). “We live in times of global crises. There are more and more conflicts and wars with a dangerous potential for escalation. And just at these times, Germany has one of, perhaps, the worst governments in its history, a government that acts without a plan, is short-sighted and in some places completely incompetent,” she emphasized, speaking at a press conference.

Wagenknecht herself opposes the transfer of weapons to Ukraine, anti-Russian sanctions and the energy policy of the current leadership of the country, aimed at implementing the “green” agenda. For example, the politician advised Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky to “be ready to compromise” because Ukraine “cannot win by military means.” She also criticized the Scholz government’s decision to abandon Russian gas, saying that “high electricity prices are killing the most important parts of our industry.” Wagenknecht’s ideas already enjoy some support in German society – according to a survey from Insa, 27% of respondents would vote for her party if possible. Along with this, 55% spoke out against the Wagenknecht party, 18% could not answer the question.

Sarah Wagenknecht is among the top 3 most popular politicians in Germany, notes Artem Sokolov, a researcher at the MGIMO Center for European Studies. As of today, she is quite capable of creating a successful party project, which will be helped by her high ratings and the decreased trust of Germans in the government. However, these same factors can hinder Wagenknecht – with high expectations from her and her new party, possible failures will have the most deplorable impact on the new political project. Sokolov adds that now the competition on the opposition flank is very high. There are both the CDU, who wants to return to power, and the far-right AfD with a rating above 20%, the expert notes.

Now in Germany there is a demand for a protest political force that could interact with other parties, says Vladislav Belov, deputy director of the Institute of Europe of the Russian Academy of Sciences. This request, as well as the coalition nature of German politics, is fully satisfied by the creation of Wagenknecht’s party, oriented towards social justice. According to Belov, Wagenknecht has prospects: the party will closely monitor its composition, preventing the penetration of outright radicals, which, for example, the AfD could not do. In his rhetoric, Wagenknecht appeals to both households and the largest economic entities in the German economy, promising them a solution to energy problems, and such appeals may well be successful among the population, Belov sums up.