Green party leader Ricarda Lang has announced that she will fill the post of federal family minister by Easter.

The previous incumbent Anne Spiegel resigned on Monday because of mistakes in the crisis management of the flood disaster in Rhineland-Palatinate last summer.

There is a need to clarify the question quickly, Lang said on Tuesday to the RTL / n-tv broadcaster.

One is in talks within the party.

Helen Bubrowski

Political correspondent in Berlin.

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On Monday evening, Realos and Linke joined together for their wing meetings, but the decision will ultimately be made in the round of six, which consists of the ministers Robert Habeck and Annalena Baerbock, the parliamentary group leaders Britta Haßelmann and Katharina Dröge and the party leaders Lang and Omid Nouripour.

parity and wing proportion

Things are not easy for the green party.

The same questions are raised that had already led to disputes when filling the cabinet in the fall: What role do parity and proportional representation play?

On Monday evening, the Greens discussed whether Anton Hofreiter, the former parliamentary group leader, could move to the head of the Ministry for Family Affairs or head another house after a cabinet reshuffle.

It is rumored among representatives of the left wing of the party that an agreement was reached with leading Realos in the fall that Hofreiter, who was left empty-handed at the time, would become the first to follow.

However, left-wingers also find that Hofreiter has not cut a particularly good figure in recent months.

Ricarda Lang, also a member of the left wing, didn't want to know anything about it on Tuesday.

"There will be a woman," she said at the board meeting in Husum.

The parliamentary group leader Haßelmann put it a little softer on Deutschlandfunk: “Anyone who knows the Greens knows how important the quota is to us and how important it is for women to be represented in top positions.

We will also take that into account when making the decision.”

The Greens have five ministers, without Spiegel there are two men and two women.

According to the green women's statute, the fifth place must be occupied by a woman.

If a man were to move up, the Federal Cabinet would no longer be on an equal footing, because the FDP has nominated three men and only one woman for its departments.

It is still unclear what significance the party wings have in the question of occupation.

When asked whether Spiegel's successor had to belong to the left wing, Lang said it was all about "competence".

There is a special responsibility for the many women and children who have come to Germany from the Ukraine and need protection here.

Appeal against multiple quotations

This position is shared by the vast majority of realos.

Daniel Mack, a former member of the green parliamentary group in Hesse, wrote on Twitter what many Realos think: "Please don't replace Anne Spiegel with multiple quotations (man/woman, Realo/Left, white (

sic

)/colorful, city/ country, east/west, etc.).”

Realos are reminding these days that many personnel decisions by the left have recently been unsatisfactory - starting with Simone Peter, the former federal chairwoman, who did not have a lucky hand, to Hofreiter, who caused the Greens to have problems explaining themselves by choosing the chair of the European Committee instead of the Interior Committee had, up to Anne Spiegel.

The family minister herself was a consequence of the wing logic.

Katrin Göring-Eckardt, longtime leader of the parliamentary group, would have liked to take over the house.

Under Realos it is described as "easy to imagine" that it will now come into play.

It is emphasized that Göring-Eckardt officially belongs to the Realo wing, but the Thuringian is considered flexible.

It speaks for her that with an experienced politician, peace would move into the green part of the cabinet.

Also in conversation are Katharina Fegebank, second mayor in Hamburg, and Katharina Schulze, leader of the Bavarian parliamentary group.

But Greens in Berlin are now warning that success at the state level does not automatically qualify for the federal government, which could be seen at Spiegel.

Within the left wing, however, there are definitely Greens who insist on adhering to the wing arithmetic.

The left fear for their influence

The left is now in the majority in the parliamentary group, as well as in some state associations, but the top offices are mostly occupied by Realos.

According to surveys, the four most popular green politicians are, alongside Baerbock and Habeck, two other realos, Cem Özdemir, the Minister of Agriculture, and Winfried Kretschmann, the Prime Minister of Baden-Württemberg.

Therefore leftists fear for their influence.

Many have not yet gotten over the fact that they have not succeeded in bringing a leading figure from their wing into the cabinet with Hofreiter.

Agnieszka Brugger, deputy group leader, and Katharina Dröge, one of the two group leaders, are brought into play from the left wing.

Both have question marks.

Brugger is a defense specialist, an important topic at the moment, and she has had little to do with family policy so far.

Dröge is still adjusting to her new role as group leader.

Lang, who is only 28 herself, doesn't consider boring age - she is 37 - to be a problem: experience is not a question of age, according to Lang.