Will Germany’s new left-wing party challenge the AfD?

Sahra Wagenknecht, a pivotal figure of the German left, has decided to go up against her former party by launching a new protest movement. Today, Wagenknecht gave a press conference announcing that she was leaving Die Linke party to run an organisation called the ‘Sahra Wagenknecht alliance’. She argued that Germany’s infrastructure was in a bad way and warned that the country faces a loss of prosperity if, among other things, it does not give up on its dogged pursuit of green policies. ‘Things cannot continue the way they are currently going,’ she said.

Over the past decade, Wagenknecht has become one of the most well-known left-wing politicians in Germany, regularly assuming anti-capitalist positions and thereby becoming an icon of the extreme left. Due to her demeanour, persona and even her hairstyle, she has been compared to Rosa Luxemburg, a founding member of Germany’s Communist party who in 1919 was murdered by members of a government-sponsored paramilitary group.

In recent years, Wagenknecht has fallen out with her party, Die Linke, over her stance on the Fridays for Future environmental movement, identity politics, Covid 19 restrictions and her pro-Russia position.