Red-Black | Honesty lasts half a year

The new cabinet met for its first meeting on March 18th. In front, Prime Minister Dietmar Woidke. Photo: dpa/Soeren Stache In January, Brandenburg's Prime Minister Dietmar Woidke (SPD) canceled his coalition with the BSW and negotiated a new one with the CDU. The new government, made possible by defections from the BSW to the SPD faction, has now been in office for six months.

Interior Minister Jan Redmann (CDU) praised the good cooperation in an interim report presented on Friday. The old cabinet also harmonized in exactly the same way for a year. On the other hand, cracks appeared between the state parliamentary groups of the SPD and BSW and there was disruption from BSW state chairwoman Friederike Benda, who tried to push through the federal party's line in Brandenburg. But all three BSW ministers didn't play along. Ultimately, five of 14 BSW MPs resigned from the party and parliamentary group. Number six recently followed.

In any case, the new coalition of SPD and CDU has not argued publicly so far, and Education Minister Gordon Hoffmann (CDU) has attracted positive attention. Unlike the SPD education ministers of the past 30 years, he did not try to sugarcoat the plight of the schools. However, he has not yet been able to improve the situation in such a short time, and it remains to be seen whether he is willing and able to do so.

»We are characterized by the courage to make quick, far-reaching changes.«

»We are characterized by the courage to make rapid, profound changes. Instead of managing crises, we are modernizing our country's structures from the ground up," claims Interior Minister Redmann. “We simplify administrative processes, reduce bureaucracy and ensure that the state is strong exactly where people need it.”

For Prime Minister Woidke, the government passed a “stress test” by quickly presenting a draft of the 2027/2028 double budget. This draft takes the realities into account, on the one hand it leads to a consolidation of finances and at the same time enables “investments in education, security, infrastructure and cohesion and thus in the future”. The aim was to close a coverage gap of around seven billion euros.

Woidke and Redmann cite the reduction in bureaucracy in building regulations as successes, for example because nature conservation committees are no longer mandatory. Or the extension of the agreement to finance the Prussian Palaces and Gardens Foundation, which Brandenburg shares with Berlin and the federal government. In the future, a quota of study places at the new Medical University in Cottbus will also be allocated to applicants who undertake to work as a family doctor in Brandenburg for several years after graduation, where they are urgently needed.

»What Dietmar Woidke and Jan Redmann sell as a courageous departure is in reality pure denial of reality. Brandenburg is not experiencing a change of course, but simply managing standstill and shortages," comments BSW parliamentary group leader Niels-Olaf Lüders. "While small and medium-sized businesses and municipalities continue to suffocate under a flood of requirements and the police and judiciary are feeling the pinch, the state government is celebrating with announcements and window speeches."

The coalition also lacks a compass in terms of financial policy. “Instead of courageously tackling structural problems at their roots and campaigning for a fair wealth tax, cuts in education and health are being covered up with budget tricks,” Lüders tells “nd”. Anyone who wants to set up an arms industry in Brandenburg while hospitals and railway lines are “going to the dogs” is setting completely the wrong priorities.

“The SPD-CDU coalition presents its balance sheet in a cosmopolitan and self-absorbed manner,” criticizes the Left state chairwoman Katharina Slanina in an interview with “nd”. Anyone who doesn't want to learn anything from the state elections in Saxony-Anhalt and Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania should carry on like Dietmar Woidke's cabinet. “We want the courage to make quick and profound changes,” confirms Slanina. Courage is needed in rent policy, profound changes in the financing of advisory services, environmental associations or the Victim Perspective Association. But no trace of it. Slanina's conclusion: "Here we are not modernizing, but rather abolishing things because the coalition is not interested in people's fears and worries."

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