Brief Information – Executive Board Meeting on March 20, 2010

By General Secretary Dietmar Bartsch

DIE LINKE has got a draft new party programme. It was presented by Party Chairs Lothar Bisky and Oskar Lafontaine, who also head the Programme Commission, at a well-attended press conference at Karl-Liebknecht-Haus in Berlin on March 20, 2010. This opened the programme debate in the party which is to result in the adoption of a new programme at a Federal Congress in Autumn 2011. This year, regional conferences will be held in September/October as part of this debate as well as a programme convention scheduled for November 6.

The Executive Board stated with satisfaction that the draft was unanimously adopted by the Programme Commission whom it thanked for its work. The Commission will remain in charge of the debate to be led by the Executive Board and the Land executives of DIE LINKE. A resolution of the Executive Board already in December last year requested party members and sympathizers to submit their ideas and suggestions concerning the new programme.

The Executive Board, which - contrary to some media reports – held no vote on the draft, had a first exchange of ideas on the party’s future political programme. The discussion revealed much consent, but, unsurprisingly, also differences on individual passages and statements occurred, and a number of missing points were named. Board members were confident that the basic lines of the programmes will meet with approval and inspire the debate within the party and among the interested public. A membership referendum which has just gone underway calls for submitting the programme to a ballot vote.

The Executive Board welcomed the initiative of nine Land branches for a membership referendum to be held from March 22 to April 23, and called on all members to take part in it. The Board had information on signatures being collected for an alternative membership referendum. In line with the party’s Federal Statutes, the Board took no decision on the latter.

At this meeting, the Board’s discussion also focussed on substantive and organizational preparations for the Federal Party Congress to meet in Rostock on May 15 and 16. It adopted a number of motions concerning rules and regulations including the proposed rules of procedure, timeframes, and the working bodies of that Congress. It decided to desist from a leading motion in its classical sense and instead to prepare a motion oriented towards present focal political issues and towards the holding of the programme debate in the party. The two Party Chairs will prepare a requisite proposal.

The Board unanimously approved of the report of its activities to the Federal Party Congress prepared by Federal Treasurer Karl Holluba and myself. It also adopted a number of motions concerning the party’s Federal Statutes which will be due in the case of the just launched membership referendum being successful and which are required if the table of candidates as proposed in January this year is to be elected accordingly.

In statements, the Executive Board calls on party members to join in Easter marches of the peace movement and supports a "May Day-Nazi-free” alliance which plans actions to stop neo-Nazi rallies in Berlin on that day. It also approved of the budget for the health campaign on which it had decided in February this year.