A captain in the distance and yet so close

You are as old as you feel is a popular counterattack that jokingly attached to what is getting on, you address her on your birthday. The Democracy Party celebrates its 70th birthday since its foundation – and looks more young than ever.

If everything runs according to plan, still party president Lex Delles, 40 years, will be replaced at the weekend at the National Congress in Limpertsberg by the reigned 37-year-old Secretary General Carole Hartmann. She is the only candidate for the party leader. Insiders assume that the liberal MP and Echternach Mayor will do her job as boss. It is considered hardworking, has a quick grasp and works – at least – for two.

« I really don’t know how she can, » Lex Delles praised when he announced in the « word » not to run again as party leader. Hartmann has proven in the municipal elections and then in the chamber elections that she dominated multitasking. It is to be given to her that the DP is going together, although the president no longer appears at every district congress because of his obligations as a minister.

The captain continues on the bridge

Under Delles’ and Bettel’s leadership, the party has rejuvenated, has reorganized itself: social, eco -conscious and nuclear -critical, modern when it comes to the family. It helps beggar never hid his homosexuality.

The ambitious lawyer had won the match against the establishment in 2013 when the party executive under Bettel’s influence for the inclusion of coalition negotiations with LSAP and Déi Gréng – and against veteran like Henri Grethen and Charles Goerens, who would rather have spoken to the CSV first. Today nobody dares to criticize the Hansdampf in all alleys for the maneuver. The party knows what to owe her secret boss.

Because the captain is probably ceded by the government bridge and travels through the world from then on as Foreign Minister. But in the DP it is still omnipresent in the important decisions. It is not only because Delles appreciates her loyalty and diligence, but beggar is also good with the lawyer that Hartmann will learn so much support.

During the Chamber election campaign tour 2023, the top candidate with the loose sayings on his lips, attraction and attraction point for many new members of younger age, but not only. There was not much left of the tired, stiff -looking party that she was in the 2000s. Better arrives so well that he put the premier twice in a row and was able to keep his party in the government a third time, albeit as a junior partner.

In terms of content, Bettel has recognized that the Luxembourg zeitgeist wants both: live well, but with a clear conscience. This includes a reasonably intact environment. And also (a little) redistribution. It is thanks to him and strategists like Claude Meisch that the liberals have put social and energy policy more at the center of their program- and thus score equally with Luxembourgers.

Although Liberale understand the welfare state in such a way that he generously supports the middle class via free childcare, free school books and free music lessons-while poor revis recipients have to prove that they want to try a job if they want to receive social assistance. Activating welfare state call sociologists the approach.

Scandals pearls like Teflon from the DP

The motto is called pragmatism instead of program. How the party the party can be can be seen from the fact that it has no problem to advertise with freedom rights and at the same time support the coalition partner in plans to further tighten the right of assembly.

At the same time, and that is central, beggar built a narrow circle of loyal supporters around them. These include former school friends such as Corinne Cahen. The entrepreneur, former family minister and reigning social deficiency of the city of Luxembourg has been known since childhood and she was also supported by him when she was attacked as a party president for her leadership style.

As a family minister, Cahen cleared the post to clear the way for Max Hahn, sporty upstart from the south. Also a clever move. If it were not the Pim Knaff personnel, the rejuvenation and Renaissance in the southern district under Marc Meyer would have succeeded. New faces have joined the party that exceeded the expectations placed in them: Barbara Agostino from Petingen, Amela Skenderovic from Esch-Alzette, to name two. But despite the severe tax evasion and although the part of the party, Knaff remained.

The party leadership decided to sit out the affair so as not to risk the blue-black-green coalition in the south. But Knaff is a risk factor: when the planned movement of Daliah Scholl, usual for the second half of the term, he is on the brake. Other young talents also torture the Escher DP in the national elections, such as the English teacher Amela Skenderovic.

The fact that the liberal scandals such as the public discussion of the Minister of Education Claude Meisch with an employee in a café or the xenophobic failures of the capital chief Simone Beissel can be survived quite undamaged by video, the cohesion at the core of the party. The behavior was criticized internally, but there were no painful consequences.

Meanwhile, Lydie Polfer keeps the reins firmly under control in the center district. Corinne Cahen had already tried to play them out in the past chamber elections. Vain. Polfer embodies the recipe for success of the DP, only on the conservative wing: well networked, optimally organized and the necessary standing and persistence at the right time.

Next to the Boy’s Club a Girl’s Club

She has had it relieved from the fact that her clean -up campaign via « Heeschebuet », such as the freedom of the individual to the edge of the credibility of her party. Likewise attacks of internal envy. The party’s old guard, Anne Brasseur, Colette Flesch and Henri Grethen, knows that she can afford it.

A group of women is now trying to copy this recipe for success and to ensure a renaissance of the women’s power in the DP: Corinne Cahen has taken the defense and transport minister Yuriko Backes as well as the doctor and research and digitization minister Stéphanie Oberin. With Amela Skenderovic, who wants to sharpen her format through the national rail, Cahen, as Vice President, wants to try to expand her influence in the party. It is important to be ready if the cards in the capital should be redistributed.

Bettel’s Boys Club is not a passé. The next in the series that wants to improve his position in the party is Eric Thill, who has registered for the post as General Secretary. It is likely that the 31-year-old former mayor of Schieren is elected. After all, he was not conjured up by anyone else as an Xavier beggar. As a delegate Minister of Tourism and Minister of Culture, he is apparently not busy, also thanks to a large – mostly male – consultant. He will also have Claude Lamberty as an assistant.