SPD MPs
Matthias Miersch saved Adis Ahmetovic from deportation – now both of them sit in the Bundestag
The 28-year-old Adis Ahmetovic entered the German Bundestag for the first time in September
© Ulrich Stamm / Picture Alliance
25 years ago, lawyer Matthias Miersch prevented the deportation of four-year-old Adis Ahmetovic and his parents to the Northern Balkans. Since the beginning of this week, both have been sitting together for the SPD in the Bundestag.
At first glance, the two SPD members of the Bundestag Matthias Miersch and Adis Ahmetovic do not share much in common – with the exception of their party affiliation. Miersch has been a member of the German Bundestag since 2005 and has been a spokesman for the parliamentary left in the Social Democrats’ parliamentary group for several years. Adis Ahmetovic is one of the many lawyers who entered the Bundestag for the first time in September.
Miersch supports the Ahmetovic family
Nevertheless, the two share a touching story. Even though Ahmetovic was born in Hanover in 1993, he and his family were threatened with deportation to the Northern Balkans again in 1996. His parents had fled the war in the collapsing Yugoslavia, but shortly after Ahmetovic was born, the region was again classified as a safe place of origin.
The parents of the young Adis fought against deportation with all possible means to enable their children to live in Germany. They finally turned to a young lawyer through an acquaintance: Matthias Miersch.
At that time, Miersch was as old as Ahmetovic is today and successfully campaigned against the deportation of the family. The breakthrough came in 2001 and the family was granted a residence permit. “I am very grateful to him that he made a life in Germany possible for me with his commitment and the reason for this is that my hard-working family and I are allowed to live here,” Ahmetovic told him star. “First Matthias Miersch was our lawyer, then we were comrades, now we are friends.”
At an event for new members of the SPD Hanover, Miersch and the young Ahmetovic met again for the first time ten years later. Over time, a close collaboration develops between the two. Together they are implementing an initiative that enables young people in Hanover to use local public transport cheaply.
Adis Ahmetovic: As a 28-year-old in the Bundestag
Ahmetovic then had a steep career in the party. Just one year after his naturalization process, he won the local elections in Hanover in 2016, and worked alongside his studies for Lower Saxony’s Prime Minister Stephan Weil and other SPD members of the state parliament. In 2020 he will be promoted to co-chair of the SPD Hanover. In September he wins the constituency “Stadt Hannover I” and replaces Kerstin Tack after 29 years as a member of the Bundestag. In Berlin, he wants to stand up for affordable living space, dignified care and a redesign of urban space.
There he will meet Matthias Miersch again regularly in the future. Despite their common history, the competencies of Ahmetovic and Miersch in the Bundestag are different. While the new MP campaigns for social justice, Miersch is considered a climate expert for the Social Democrats.
The 52-year-old was able to prevail in his constituency in the Hanoverian area against the chairman of the Junge Union Tilman Kuban and is now in his fifth legislative period in the Reichstag. Ahmetovic is happy about the success of his comrade: “Our history naturally connects us beyond politics. 24 years later we are sitting together in the Bundestag for the Hanover region. That is an indescribable feeling.”
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Sources: Phoenix, NDR, vorwärts.de