Hanover Four SPD associations have applied for a procedure to have former Chancellor Gerhard Schröder expelled from the party. These are applications from the Social Democrats in Heidelberg, in the Rhine-Palatinate district, in Leipzig East/Northeast and in Essen-Frohnhausen/Altendorf, said the managing director of the responsible SPD district in Hanover, Christoph Matterne, on Thursday.
Some other applications were not valid for formal reasons, Matterne told the German Press Agency. First, the “Hannoversche Allgemeine Zeitung” reported on the process.
Schröder has been criticized for years for his commitment to Russian state-owned companies – against the background of the Russian attack on Ukraine, the pressure on him is increasing. At the beginning of March, the SPD leadership and Chancellor Olaf Scholz had asked the former head of government to resign from his posts at Russian state-owned companies.
A loss of his honorary citizenship in Hanover is also in the room.
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According to the newspaper report, Schröder and the arbitration commission of the SPD district of Hanover can now agree on an oral hearing or a written procedure. “Schröder can now express himself,” said the chairman of the commission, Heiger Scholz, who also heads Lower Saxony’s Corona crisis team. Whether and how Schröder does that remains to be seen. Lower Saxony’s Europe Minister Birgit Honé is also a member of the arbitration commission, which is bound to secrecy on the matter.
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