These politicians have made a comeback: Back in the Federal Palace!

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They were voted out once. Or moved to another office. But they cannot keep their hands off politics: more than twenty former national council members tried to make their comeback in Bern on Sunday. It didn’t work for most of them.

Most prominent among those who failed: GLP woman Chantal Galladé (50, ZH). In 2018, the Zurich resident resigned from the National Council after fifteen years. Now she made a new attempt for the Green Liberals. In any case, it was enough for a respectable success: she fought her way up from 21st place on the list to 8th place. However, because the GLP only has four seats in Zurich, any derailment during Galladé’s term of office is still far away.

Former State Councilor Poggia would like to join the Council of States

The comeback was a success for a French men’s trio. The best known of these is the former State Councilor of Geneva, Mauro Poggia (64), of the right-wing citizen protest movement Mouvement Citoyens Genevois (MCG). He briefly served as a national councilor from 2011 to 2013 before being elected to the cantonal government of Geneva, where he served until last spring. As Minister of Health, he made a name for himself throughout Switzerland during the Corona crisis, because he also enforced strict measures in his canton and shot people against opponents of vaccination. During the election campaign he made health insurance premiums a major problem.

Now the people of Geneva are sending the popular politician to the National Council – and perhaps even to the Council of States – with a brilliant result. He came out on top in the first round, but has to move on to the second round. It will be decided on November 12 in which chamber Poggia will take a seat.

Ex-cop returns

In addition to Poggia, another MCG politician made the jump back to Bern in Geneva: party leader Roger Golay (64). In 2013 he replaced Poggia in the National Council. The now retired police officer joined the SVP faction and served on the Security Policy Committee.

He wanted to limit the number of cross-border commuters through a proposal. He was voted out of office in 2019 and is now returning to federal parliament as a national councilor. In Bern he wants to pay special attention to safety and traffic issues, he told ‘Le Temps’.

Gaddafi’s former lawyer

The third in the trio from Geneva: Charles Poncet (76), who moves to Bern for the SVP. His time in the National Council goes back a long time: from 1991 to 1995 he politicized in the grand chamber for the Liberal Party (LPS), which merged with the FDP fifteen years ago. So now the SVP. “We must protect the most vulnerable from crime, which is constantly increasing due to poorly managed immigration, with the middle class being the first victims,” he said on the party website.

Poncet caused a stir years ago in a very different role. The business lawyer represented the Libyan side in the dispute over the arrest of the ruler’s son, Hannibal Gaddafi, 48, in Switzerland in 2008. Gaddafi was temporarily arrested in Geneva after two housekeepers accused him of assault and reported it. An incident that continued to concern Switzerland for a long time as part of the so-called ‘Libya affair’.

Not only is Poncet a dazzling figure, but he will turn 77 at the end of this year and is also Bern’s oldest national councilor.

Source:Blick