Government elections BS A look back at the legislative term of Basel's Director of Education Atici

On October 20, the canton of Basel-Stadt will hold general elections for the new government. In a series, the Keystone-SDA news agency reviews the most important dossiers of the incumbent government councillors. Part 6: Mustafa Atici (SP).

Mustafa Atici (SP)

Following the election of Beat Jans to the Federal Council last April, the SP was able to defend its government seat with former National Councillor Atici. The 55-year-old catering entrepreneur of Kurdish origin received 2970 votes more than his challenger Luca Urgese from the FDP in the by-election and has been a member of the Basel government since May. He took over the Department of Education from Conradin Cramer (LDP), who moved to the Presidential Department. Atici's short term in office was characterized by these issues, which are not exhaustive.

Support classes initiative: The most important issue for Atici in recent months was the support classes initiative. Last Wednesday, he made his first major appearance in the Grand Council. With 92 votes to 0 and 4 abstentions, parliament approved the counter-proposal of the Education and Culture Committee, which was supported by the government. The initiative was withdrawn. Atici (SP) spoke out in favor of the counter-proposal. This package of measures is a solution-oriented compromise that provides schools with various instruments, he said in parliament.

The counter-proposal stipulates that schools can create remedial classes, but only for children with learning difficulties and learning disorders, not for children with behavioral problems. The bill wants to leave it up to schools to decide whether or not they want to introduce remedial classes. In addition, the teachers in the classroom are to be supported with curative and socio-pedagogical support with double staffing.

The remedial classes initiative submitted in 2022 wanted to end integrative teaching and have pupils with behavioral problems taught in separate classes again.

Negotiations on the university contract with Baselland: Atici is currently negotiating intensively with the canton of Basel-Landschaft regarding the performance mandate for the university from 2026. The Basel SVP unsuccessfully called for Baselland to terminate the university contract with Basel-Stadt in the cantonal parliament in May. However, the cost-cutting efforts in the Basel region are still ongoing and there is open discussion in Basel politics about cutting contributions. Basel-Landschaft currently pays almost 165 million francs to the University of Basel.