Oskar Lafontaine, Germany’s former finance minister who has been leading Die Linke for the past years, is to retreat from the national political stage.

He announced it in an enthusiastic speech in his home state of Saarland, and that is where he wants to concentrate his more limited activities. 

Because of his health problems, Mr Lafontaine said he would step down as leader of the Left party, a party he helped to found. Mr Lafontaine will not look for re-election as party chairman and will also renounce from his seat in the Bundestag, Germany’s lower house of parliament.

Mr Lafontaine was very influential in forging the Left party from other smaller groups. It took 12 per cent of the national vote in September’s election, it has reached 72 of the 622 seats in the Bundestag and pressed the SPD vote down to 23 per cent.

He announced his decision during the weekend, but only on Tuesday, after a long, late night session, a new succession agreement was reached.  There would again be a double leadership of the party, a man from the West and a woman from the East. 

Klaus Ernst, 55, a metal worker who got a university degree, and who was a leader in the 35-hour-week strikes and other union protests, would help strengthen urgently needed connections with the labor movement.  And, Gesine Loetzsch, 48, linguist by profession, has been elected by her district in the East Berlin borough of Lichtenberg, most recently with an invincible 47.5 percent of the votes.  From 2002 until 2005 she and one other woman held the only two party seats in the Bundestag.  A brave woman from the East, but who wants to cement all sections of the party, seems to be the right person for this new leadership job. She has recently declared in an interview that she will step up the fight against widespread hardship and attacks against working people and the jobless. Oskar Lafontaine has added his health will permit him to help out.  Mr Lafontaine will stay in regional politics but had already been succeeded as the Left’s parliamentary leader by Grigor Gysi.