Mecklenburg-Vorpommern state election, 2006
- PDS: 13
- SPD: 23
- FDP: 7
- CDU: 22
- NPD: 6
In the state elections in Mecklenburg- Vorpommern, 2006, the fifth parliament of Mecklenburg -Vorpommern was chosen. The election took place on 17 September 2006. Here, the Diet was first elected for a term of five years. After the state elections were in 1994, 1998 and 2002 occurred simultaneously with the general election, the election dates were due to the early federal election in 2005 for the first time apart. Therefore, the turnout fell from 70.6 % to 59.2 %, significantly, but not as much as previously feared and predicted.
Starting position
Since 1998, reigned in Mecklenburg- Western Pomerania has a red - red coalition under Prime Minister Harald Ringstorff (Cabinet Ringstorff I), which was continued after the state elections in 2002 (Cabinet Ringstorff II). In the three-party system of SPD, CDU and PDS, the CDU was the only opposition party.
For the first time since 1990, the state election was conducted separately from the general election. This had a significant decline in voter turnout for the sequence that had stood at nearly 80 percent and 2002 at 70.6 percent in 1998. However, in comparison to other states feared extremely low turnout did not come. A particularly strong voter mobilization succeeded in a campaign against the entry of the NPD to parliament, which was carried in a nationwide unprecedented action by all three regional newspapers and radio stations in the country.
The simultaneity of the state elections with the general election favored a 1994-2006 unusually stable three-party system of the SPD, the CDU and the PDS or the Left Party. The polarization effect in favor of political parties CDU and SPD as well as the high turnout difficult tend to be the smaller parties a place in Parliament, so that the FDP, Alliance 90/The Greens and the NPD and other right-wing parties regularly failed due to the five-percent hurdle. Only in 1990, the FDP had succeeded almost the entry into the state legislature.
Top candidates
Top candidate of the SPD was Prime Minister Harald Ringstorff. For the CDU Jürgen Seidel emerged as the top candidate on the PDS nominated Environment Minister Wolfgang Methling and for the FDP came to Michael Roolf. For the Greens, Ulrike Sailor Katz and Hendrik Fulda competed. For the NPD, Udo Pastörs stood as the top candidate.
Electioneering
By decoupling the state assembly and the general election national political issues have been significantly upgraded and were now no longer interfere as much of the federal policy. Still 2002 nationwide or even foreign policy issues (Elbe flood, Iraq War) had determined the election in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern.
The economic problems in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern were all other dominant issue before the election. In a survey of infrastructure dimap on behalf of ARD, 88 percent of respondents unemployment and 27 percent cited the economy as the most important problems facing the country, followed by education (21 percent) and social injustice (10 percent). A controversial national political issue was the administrative and district reform. The CDU rejected this off and filed suit in the election campaign, however, a. After the election they occupied, however, the charge of the district reform the Interior Ministry and led the project in the grand coalition on. Unpopular was also the G8 summit in Heiligendamm in 2007, especially the operation against the Left Party election campaign.
Election result and distribution of seats
In the election occurred in 16 parties. The state election had the following result:
According to the official results, the ruling with the PDS SPD suffered under Prime Minister Harald Ringstorff against the good, influenced by strong national trend results from 2002 losses in the double-digit range, but remained almost the strongest force in front of the CDU. The CDU suffered losses of 2.5 percentage points, but received the majority of directly elected seats, while the PDS their 2002 result stabilized ( 0.4 %). Wolfgang Methling ( Left Party ) won the only direct mandate did not go to a candidate of the CDU or SPD in parliament constituency Rostock II. The FDP moved with an increase of 4.9 percentage points and a score of 9.6 percent for the first time since the 1990 election again in the state parliament. The largest gains ( 6.5 percentage points) scored the NPD, with a result of 7.3 percent and six deputies could move in the state legislature for the first time and in the eastern part of the country scored votes shares of up to 15 percent. The Greens failed despite a slight electoral gains ( 0.8 percentage points) with a result of 3.4 percent, well on their way into the parliament.
With the advent of FDP and NPD in the Landtag expanded the political spectrum from the three-party for five-party system. For especially caused a stir cutting off the right-wing extremist NPD. With a mixture of critique of capitalism, conspiracy theories, nationalism or national socialism, populism and revanchist local ties she used during the election campaign, the widespread party disaffection of voters. Voters hikes over 2002 in favor of the NPD appear alongside 12,000 former non-voters from an influx of 12,000 CDU, SPD 7000 and 4000 PDS voters.
Government formation
The previous red - red coalition would have 36 of 71 seats, although still had a slim majority in parliament, but the SPD opted for a grand coalition with the CDU (Cabinet Ringstorff III). Thus it came in Mecklenburg- Western Pomerania after 1994 and 1998 for the third time to half a change of government in which a coalition partner in the government was to form a coalition with a new partner. Harald Ringstorff was re-elected with 42 of 71 possible votes as Prime Minister, although the coalition had 45 seats. His opponent Udo Pastörs (NPD ) received six votes, which corresponds to the number of the NPD parliamentary mandates. On 3 October 2008 Ringstorff resigned ( for reasons of age ) and two other ministers, the new prime minister was the former Social Minister Erwin Selle ring (SPD ) of the Cabinet Selle ring I lists ever since.