When the Berlin elections are repeated in February, Bettina Garrasch is supposed to lead the Greens to victory. At the party’s minor convention, 92.5 percent of the delegates voted for her to run for governor’s mayoralty.
On Saturday afternoon, the Green Party in Berlin elected Bettina Garrasch as its best candidate for re-election on February 12. At the small party convention in Berlin, 37 of the 40 delegates present voted for the incumbent senator on transport and the environment, which corresponds to an approval rating of 92.5 percent. The 53-year-old led the Greens on the campaign trail last year.
In accordance with the ruling of the State Constitutional Court, parties must compete with the same applicants as on September 26, 2021 – this applies to both list and direct candidates. However, the Green Party again chose Garrasch as the top candidate. It was not actually necessary, but was intended by the party leadership as a signal of support for Jarash.
“We can do it,” Grach told the delegates in her request letter. At times like this, it doesn’t matter who makes the biggest promises “and who shouts the loudest.” It is about keeping promises.
Garsch made it clear that she wanted to continue to rule with the SPD and the left, but as the leader of this coalition: “Berlin deserves a new leadership, and I am ready to take on this leadership.” The transportation senator announced far-reaching reforms, and above all “radical administrative reform.” “We owe a functioning city to the people,” Jarash says.
The 53-year-old clearly criticized the coalition partner’s Social Democratic Party, especially the ruling mayor Franziska Giffe and the incumbent senator Andreas Geisel, who was the interior senator in the last election. “One thing is not working: claim success for yourself and at the same time walk away when the city is not working as well as it should be.” Garsh has announced that he wants to speed up the mobility transition and fight for affordable housing. And: The climate referendum must also be voted on on Election Day, i.e. on February 12, 2023.
The Senate administration had previously announced that the referendum would likely not take place on the same day the House of Representatives was re-elected. Because the further organization of the referendum will be a huge challenge in the short term.
The Greens’ programmatic focus on the campaign trail is to demand sweeping administrative reform, Garsh and other speakers at the party’s small convention made clear. A clearer division of tasks between the state and district levels is necessary for the city to function again. The Green Party is calling for the creation of a “political district office”: mayors and city councilors should be elected more often than before according to the election results of the district parliaments.
On Wednesday, the Constitutional Court decided to rerun the entire House of Representatives elections. The vote was invalid due to “serious methodological flaws” and numerous electoral errors. The election date was published in Berlin’s Official Gazette on Friday.
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