The AfD politician promises non-partisan leadership and calls for an end to political firewalls
AI-generated summary
The AfD is classified as right-wing extremist by the Office for the Protection of the Constitution. The election is seen as a mood test for the planned election of an AfD prime minister in December.
The newly elected state parliament president of Saxony-Anhalt, AfD politician Tobias Rausch, has promised to run the office in a non-partisan manner. “I will not hold this office as president of a faction, but I will hold it as president of the entire state parliament of Saxony-Anhalt,” said Rausch after his election. He wanted to be measured by that. He himself experienced from the opposition how controversial parliamentary rules and procedures could be and how regulations had been changed. “But I don’t want to turn this into a reckoning with the past.”
Rausch was elected with 48 of 82 votes cast. That is four more votes than the AfD and BSW have in common. In the run-up to the election, only the BSW had announced that it would vote for Rausch as state parliament president. The election is also seen as a mood test for the election of a possible AfD prime minister. The AfD has announced this for December.
Rausch: Parliament must control and question
“A government must be able to act, but a government also needs a strong parliament that controls, questions and, if necessary, contradicts,” said Rausch. “This is not a disruption of the democratic process, this is the democratic process.” Precisely for this reason, rules must be created and maintained that would still be considered correct even if they benefited the political opponent.
Political toughness in the matter and personal respect are not mutually exclusive, said Rausch. He also emphasized: “The days of political firewalls should be a thing of the past.” There is a time ahead of the state parliament that will not be short of political disputes. Even before the speech by the new President of the State Parliament, the leader of the Green Party, Susan Sziborra-Seidlitz, declared in a speech that a limit had been crossed by electing a member of a clearly right-wing extremist and anti-constitutional party as President of the State Parliament.
AI outlook — possibilities, not facts
Election of an AfD prime minister in December
Possible · Within months
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