"I'm certainly not the last communist"

We meet Ali Ruckert on the premises of the Zeitung vum Lëtzebuerger Vollek. The KPL president has been its editor-in-chief for over 30 years. The same building at 3 Rue Zénon Bernard, named after one of the founders of the KPL and the first communist MP – and that surely cannot be a coincidence -, is also conveniently home to the KPL headquarters.

The interview with the outgoing president takes place in a crowded meeting room that is in the process of being renovated. Books, posters, newspapers and moving boxes are piled up everywhere; on the wall are portraits of Lenin and Engels as well as a reproduction of Picasso's Guernica. Ali Ruckert takes plenty of time for us and is not sparing with anecdotes, which unfortunately cannot be quoted.

Lëtzebuerger Journal: Leaving aside Jean Asselborn, Luxembourg's other famous moustache, you, the most famous moustache in our country, will soon be stepping down after more than 25 years at the head of your party. Have you really thought this step through? After all, a captain doesn't abandon a sinking ship.

Ali Ruckert: It's not as if the captain is abandoning his ship, which, by the way, is not sinking at all, but is still seaworthy, even if the sea is now very stormy for us. In any case, the captain remains on board, but takes on a different role.

Do you already know what your future role will be?

No, that is up to the Central Committee, which is the actual leadership of the party and is elected at our congress. The president is only the primus inter pares (eng. 'first among equals', ed.).

But to the outside world, you were clearly the face of the KPL.

That may be true. If I am re-elected to the Central Committee at the congress, I will certainly continue my work there.

And when is this congress?

Probably in October or November.

With your unmistakable Peppone look, you have certainly shaped your party like no other in recent years and decades. You are regarded as the last of the Mohicans of the KPL, the Last Man Standing. After you, there is now only Jean-Claude Juncker, who has always liked to describe himself as the last communist. So who is supposed to take over the role of president? We can't think of any other communist besides you at the moment.

We have a few hundred members…