Berlin Left Party leadership asks Vanessa Emde to give up her seat

The executive board of the Berlin Left Party asked Vanessa Emde, a member of the state parliament from Neukölln, on Friday evening to return her mandate. State chairs Kerstin Wolter and Maximilian Schirmer said the party no longer trusts her and accused her of repeatedly and deliberately disregarding joint decisions. They stressed that mandates are won collectively through the work and votes of candidates, members and the whole party.

The board justified the demand with a series of violations of the mandate-holder agreement, which the party concluded with all candidates well before the election. It requires MPs to follow the party and election programmes. According to Tagesspiegel information, Emde is accused of breaching it in more than ten cases.

Emde had repeatedly made remarks that could be read as questioning Israel's right to exist, which stalled coalition talks between the Left, the Greens and the SPD. The two prospective partners made her expulsion a condition. Preliminary talks, now concluded successfully, had been interrupted because of her.

Party insiders do not expect her to comply. If she refuses, the leadership of the parliamentary group is expected to table a motion on Tuesday to expel her from the group. A week later, at least two thirds of the group would need to back it, and exceeding that quorum is considered likely. Her sympathisers see the move as the leadership caving in to a media "campaign", though they are a divided minority within the party.