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Wolfgang Zimmermann (born 14 December 1949 in Leichlingen, West Germany) is a German politician and trade unionist. He was the state spokesperson for the Left Party in North Rhine-Westphalia from 2007 until 2010, and he represented (and was chairperson of the parliamentary group of) the Left in the Landtag of North Rhine-Westphalia from 2010 until 2012. He is also a member of the party managing board.
From 1972 until 1975, Zimmerman studied at the Fachhochschule Düsseldorf, where he graduated with a Diplom in social work. [1] Zimmermann has been a trade-unionist since 1973. Until November 2010, he was the chairperson of the Vereinte Dienstleistungsgewerkschaft district of Rhine-Wupper, and until March 2011, he was a member of the Vereinte Dienstleistungsgewerkschaft managing board in the state. Until May 2010, he represented full-time the employees of a hospital in Langenfeld where he was employed. Before joining the Labour and Social Justice – The Electoral Alternative (a precursor to the Left), he gained political experience with the Party of Democratic Socialism. He is a member of the socialist group International Socialist Left, a Trotskyist organization in Germany.
He replaced Hüseyin Kenan Aydın as the state spokesperson for the Labour and Social Justice – The Electoral Alternative in June 2005, and in November of that year, he was re-elected as spokesperson, together with his colleague Katherina Schwabedissen.
During the inaugural convention of the Left in North Rhine-Westphalia in Gladbeck on 20 October 2007, Zimmermann became the state spokesperson with 256 of 287 votes cast. He shared this office with Ulrike Detjen until 18 October 2008. During the state party convention on 18 October 2008, which was held in Essen, he was again elected to be spokesperson with 156 of 226 votes cast. Following the departure of Ulrike Detjen, he served in this position with Katharina Schwabedissen until July 2010.
In the 2010 state election, Wolfgang Zimmermann won a seat in the Landtag of North Rhine-Westphalia as the second person on the state party lists. In the inaugural meeting of the parliamentary group, he was elected (together with Bärbel Beuermann) to be the group's spokesperson. [1] In the 2012 state election, the party again selected him to be listed second on the party lists. During a medical examination in the course of his campaign, he was discovered to have lung cancer, but despite this, he did not end his bid for election. When the Left failed to garner enough votes to surpass the 5% threshold required to remain in parliament, Zimmerman lost his seat.
Zimmermann occasionally writes articles for the Socialist Newspaper (Sozialistische Zeitung) and is associated with the "Anti-Capitalist Left", an anti-capitalist, anti-militarist caucus within the Left Party.
North Rhine-Westphalia, commonly shortened to NRW in both written and spoken language, is the most populous of the 16 states of Germany.
Wolfgang Clement was a German politician and a member of the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD). He was the 7th Minister President of North Rhine-Westphalia from 27 May 1998 to 22 October 2002 and Federal Minister of Economics and Labour from 2002 to 2005. He was an Honorary Member of the International Raoul Wallenberg Foundation.
Jürgen Rüttgers is a German politician of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) who served as the 9th Minister President of North Rhine-Westphalia from 2005 to 2010.
Katja Kipping is a German politician of The Left and member of the Bundestag representing Saxony. She has been co-chairperson of The Left from 2012 to 2021 alongside Bernd Riexinger.
The Left, also commonly referred to as the Left Party, is a democratic socialist political party in Germany. The party was founded in 2007 as the result of the merger of the Party of Democratic Socialism (PDS) and Labour and Social Justice – The Electoral Alternative (WASG). Through PDS, the party is the direct descendant of the Marxist-Leninist ruling party of the former East Germany (GDR), the Socialist Unity Party of Germany (SED).
The Politics of North Rhine-Westphalia takes place within a framework of a federal parliamentary representative democratic republic. The two main parties are the Centre-right Christian Democratic Union and the Centre-left Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD).
The Landtag of North Rhine-Westphalia is the state parliament (Landtag) of the German federal state of North Rhine-Westphalia, which convenes in the state capital of Düsseldorf, in the eastern part of the district of Hafen. The parliament is the central legislative body in the political system of North Rhine-Westphalia. In addition to passing of laws, its most important tasks are the election of the Minister-President of the state and the administration of the government. The current parties of government are a coalition of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) and the Free Democratic Party (FDP), supporting the cabinet of Minister-President Armin Laschet since June 2017.
Christian Wolfgang Lindner is a German politician, member of the Bundestag, and leader of the liberal Free Democratic Party of Germany (FDP).
Hannelore Kraft is a German politician. She served as the Minister President of North Rhine-Westphalia from 2010 until 2017. Kraft was the first woman to serve as head of government of this state and was the third woman to become head of a state government in Germany. Between 1 November 2010 and 31 October 2011, she was the President of the Bundesrat, again the first woman to hold the office. She is the former leader of the SPD North Rhine-Westphalia and served on the SPD's federal executive from November 2009 until May 2017, and was one of the four federal deputy chairs.
Bärbel Beuermann is a German politician, and was a member of the Landtag of North Rhine-Westphalia as a list MP since the state election held on 9 May 2010. She is the joint leader of the party in the Landtag, and is also a member of The Left's national party executive. After the election of 2012 in North Rhine-Westphalia she retired from the Landtag of North Rhine-Westphalia.
The 2012 North Rhine-Westphalia state election was held on 13 May 2012 to elect the members of the Landtag of North Rhine-Westphalia. The incumbent minority government of the Social Democratic Party (SPD) and The Greens led by Minister-President Hannelore Kraft was returned with a majority and continued in office.
The Left of North Rhine-Westphalia is the chapter of the Left Party in the German federal state of North Rhine-Westphalia.
Rüdiger Sagel is a German politician currently with the Left Party and previously with the Alliance '90/The Greens. From 1998 until 2012 he was a member of the state parliament (Landtag) for North Rhine-Westphalia. On 30 June 2012 he and Gunhild Böth were elected in Münster as state spokespersons for the Left in North Rhine-Westphalia.
Michael Georg Aggelidis is a German politician of the Left Party in North Rhine-Westphalia.
Ali Atalan is a Kurdish-German politician of Yazidi descent. Formerly a member of the Landtag of North Rhine-Westphalia with Die Linke, he is currently a member of the Turkish Parliament with the Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP).
Andreas Pinkwart is a German politician and academic who currently serves as State Minister for Economic Affairs, Digitization, Innovation and Energy in the government of Minister-President Armin Laschet. He previously was the Dean of HHL Leipzig Graduate School of Management and holder of the Stiftungsfonds Deutsche Bank Chair of Innovation Management and Entrepreneurship.
Edgar Moron is a German politician for the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD). He served in the Landtag of North Rhine-Westphalia for twenty years, from 1990 to 2010, reaching the position of 1st Vice President in 2005.
Svenja Schulze is a German politician of the Social Democratic Party (SPD) from Münster in Westphalia.
Matthias W. Birkwald is a German politician. Since October 2009 he has been a member of the German Bundestag.
Norbert Walter-Borjans is a German economist and politician of the Social Democratic Party (SPD) who has been serving as co-leader of the SPD since 2019. He served as minister of finance of the federal state of North Rhine-Westphalia from 2010 until 2017.
