AfD and BSW explore common ground in Magdeburg – will BSW help Siegmund?
At a panel in Magdeburg the AfD courted the BSW for firm cooperation. But BSW figures point to their pledge not to vote for Ulrich Siegmund.
Archive image · Photo: Roy Zuo / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0 (cropped and resized)
At a panel with AfD and BSW representatives in Magdeburg, AfD parliamentary co-leader Oliver Kirchner said he could imagine firm cooperation with the BSW. 'They have a lot of common ground with us,' he said, asking for terms to be negotiated first and put in writing. Around 100 people attended the event on peace, migration and the review of the coronavirus pandemic.
The key question was whether the BSW would, despite its pledge, vote for AfD politician Ulrich Siegmund as state premier. Former Left party politician Diether Dehm said: 'The firewall is only gone once Uli Siegmund is elected.' BSW state lawmaker Christian Dorst from Brandenburg replied that it was not that simple, since the BSW had campaigned on not voting for Siegmund.
The AfD clearly won the Saxony-Anhalt state election in September but fell short of governing alone: it holds 39 seats, the CDU, Left, Greens and SPD together also 39, and the BSW 5. The BSW rules out a coalition with the AfD; its members plan to abstain in the premier election in December.