Reinickendorf | A city councilor for the Left, not a city councilor for the AfD

Sebastian Pieper is still missing from the district mayors' gallery, but there is a photo of Emine Demirbüken-Wegner. Photo: Imago/Jürgen Ritter “Would you still sign this?” Emine Demirbüken-Wegner (CDU) whispers to Felix Lederle (Left). »And you would have to sign here too, okay. All the best.” Since April 2023, Demirbüken-Wegner has been the full-time mayor of the Berlin district of Reinickendorf. At the age of 65, a new phase of life begins on Thursday evening. Demirbüken-Wegner was elected honorary head of the District Council Assembly (BVV) with 42 votes from the 55 district council members present. In this new role, Demirbüken-Wegner handed Felix Lederle his certificate of appointment late on Thursday evening and he acknowledged it with his signature. Lederle was recently elected as a full-time city councilor with 38 votes and will be responsible for education, culture and sport.

Before the Berlin election on September 20th, Lederle was the only left-wing district councilor in Reinickendorf. But with a record result of 14.9 percent, it was now not only enough for a nine-member parliamentary group, but also for a city council position for the first time in Reinickendorf.

The BVV elected Sebastian Pieper (CDU) as the new district mayor with 45 votes and city councilors Sascha Braun (CDU) with 39 votes, Alexander Ewers (SPD) with 38 votes and Korinna Stephan (Greens) with 35 votes. Braun is now an environmental councilor, Ewers is a youth councilor and Stephan is a social councilor. Everyone only needs one ballot each.

But Thomas Ruschin (AfD) failed in four rounds of voting. He should have been deputy district mayor. This position remains vacant for the time being. Ruschin was already a city councilor in Reinickendorf. That was from 2006 to 2011. But in 2020 he left the CDU and joined the AfD. The fact that the CDU wanted to vote for former party friend Ruschin, even though he now belongs to the AfD, caused a stir before the BVV's inaugural meeting. But in this case, in a secret vote, the fire wall will only be severely damaged, but not completely torn down.

"Where people are belittled, minorities excluded, democratic institutions made contemptible or fears stirred up, we must not remain silent."

“We are coming together today in a special political situation,” warns senior president Karin Hiller-Ewers (SPD) for good reason when she opened the BVV meeting. "Where people are belittled, minorities excluded, democratic institutions made contemptible or fears stirred up, we must not remain silent."

Thomas Ruschin would have needed 28 votes, or more than the two abstentions or invalid votes that he could achieve at most in four consecutive ballots. But nothing comes of it. In the first two rounds there are only 26 votes, in the next two rounds 27. But that's not enough, even if Ruschin improves slightly from round to round and in the last attempt so far he narrowly fails with 27 votes to 27 on an invalid ballot paper. He can and wants to try again at the next BVV meeting on November 18th. It's possible later too. As soon as just one of the district councilors who consistently voted against Ruschin is absent from a meeting, the AfD could still get its city council position.

The CDU has 16 seats in the BVV, the AfD eleven. That's a total of 27. If at least one of two BSW district representatives had played along because the Wagenknecht party considers the firewall policy to be a failure and didn't go along with it, then that would have been enough. According to BSW state chairman Alexander King, they elected Ruschin. “I assume that both voted yes,” he told “nd” on Friday. They would have assured him.

Either there were two CDU district councilors who remained steadfast until the end or it was - as King tends to believe - a set-up game. King doesn't want to completely rule out the possibility that someone in the AfD refused to follow. This can always happen in secret elections.

»The Berlin CDU has torn down the AfD's firewall twice within one day. “First in the House of Representatives, then in the Reinickendorf district assembly,” complains MP Ario Mirzaie (Greens). He calculates that eleven CDU representatives in the House of Representatives probably supported the failed election of Martin Trefzer (AfD) as parliamentary vice-president. That is almost a third of the CDU parliamentary group and "a slap in the face of all those who work daily in our city against right-wing extremism, racism and anti-Semitism." In Reinickendorf, almost the entire CDU parliamentary group voted with the AfD and BSW. However, this voting behavior has initially only brought the AfD two positions as secretary on the BVV board. Christopher Wiedenhaupt and Maria Arlt were elected with 28 votes each.

Former district mayor Demirbüken-Wegner wants community spirit and the willingness to approach one another, listen and stand up for one another. She not only uses the first name of Felix Lederle from the Left, but also all other city councilors.

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