Strausberg | Almost mayor in the second attempt

Annette Binder was mayor for a few days after the annulled election and could now be mayor for eight years. Photo: dpa/Julia Otto Who will be the new mayor of Strausberg will be decided on October 11th in a runoff election between the non-party Annette Binder and the FDP member Robert Krause, who ran as a single candidate. Binder achieved 48.3 percent in the mayoral election on Sunday and was therefore not far away from an absolute majority in which there would have been no runoff election at all. Krause received 19.0 percent of the vote.

The candidate Knut Steinkopf (Left Party) narrowly missed the runoff again with 18.6 percent. This happened to him in the mayoral election in February. This election now had to be repeated. At that time, there was suspicion of election manipulation due to an unusually low return rate for requested postal voting documents. In the spring, Annette Binder emerged as the winner of the runoff election.

Now the fourth applicant, Stephan Blumenthal, received 14.0 percent. He ran for the CDU in the mayoral election eight years ago and failed there too. This time he tried it as an independent individual candidate and didn't achieve any better results. The voter turnout was 47.9 percent.

Knut Steinkopf (Left Party) explained that his election campaign was also an attempt to show how politics could work differently, close to the people and with an invitation to take part yourself. They knocked on almost 12,000 front doors, distributed 36,000 election newspapers and around 8,000 flyers - "and kept winning over new people who came with us," said Steinkopf. »We as leftists in Strausberg have become more – and we have become more capable of acting. That's why we don't measure the success of this election campaign solely by the election results. What we have built together remains: people who know each other, take responsibility and are ready to help shape their city. Because a social and climate-proof city does not only emerge in the town hall or in the city council. It arises where people get involved.«

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