Berlin Robert Habeck started running, but stopped again. His State Secretary Patrick Graichen was able to walk into the SPD parliamentary group hall next to him at the same height. It was an attempt at a sign of unity. Habeck and Graichen stand side by side, despite all the demands for dismissal.
But the pressure on the Federal Minister of Economics and his most important employees is immense. The committees for the economy and for energy and climate protection had summoned the minister and his top officials to a survey on Wednesday afternoon. The reason: Graichen had helped his best man Michael Schäfer to get a lucrative job as head of the German Energy Agency (Dena) and kept secret his personal relationship.
The extraordinary agenda in the Bundestag required extraordinary premises. In order to accommodate all committee members, they moved to the SPD parliamentary group hall. For almost two and a half hours, the deputies Habeck and Graichen peppered with their questions. Opposition and parts of the FDP attacked. The Greens tried to defend themselves.
But Economics Minister Habeck’s party has long been in trouble itself. In the previous committee meetings, it was decided whether the questioning of Habeck and Graichen should take place in public. The Greens, participants report, did not vote uniformly. In both committees, the majority ultimately voted against a public meeting and only for the timely publication of the minutes of the meeting.
At the beginning of the session, it was Habeck himself who regretted that the public was not there. The Union requested a new vote, but the result remained the same. The opposition, as well as the SPD and FDP behind closed doors, assessed the preparations of the Greens as unprofessional.
Greens take coalition partners by surprise
According to information from the Handelsblatt, the Greens had only suggested to the coalition partners at eight in the morning that the special session should be held in public as an exception. SPD and FDP felt taken by surprise, committee meetings are usually not held in public.
The survey did not bring any fundamentally new insights into Graichen’s misconduct when filling the Dena post – but interesting details. Graichen said he knew eight more of the eleven applicants. The fact that his best man was there was only a “gradual” difference.
Habeck at the farewell of the Dena chairman on Tuesday. Secretary of State for Economic Affairs Patrick Graichen’s best man is resigning from his position at the head of the energy agency Dena.
(Photo: dpa)
In the job interviews, Graichen used to address all applicants, he is said to have explained, according to participants. In addition, his vote alone was not decisive in the three-person selection committee.
Graichen admitted that he should have resigned from the Commission. He “regrets and regrets” the mistake. These statements were not enough for the Union. She wants to request another questioning of Habeck and Graichen, this time publicly. Julia Klöckner, economic policy spokeswoman for the CDU/CSU, renewed her call for Graichen to be dismissed. The Secretary of State had deceived Habeck: “That’s why we think it should have consequences.”
Further inconsistencies put Graichen under pressure
Habeck defended his state secretary after the meeting. “I have decided that Patrick Graichen does not have to go because of this mistake,” said the Vice Chancellor in front of television cameras, while Graichen disappeared in the elevator behind him without a word. Habeck called on the opposition not to mix up the “error” in the Dena process with other things: “There was a web of untruths and insinuations”.
The allegations against Graichen are manifold. He had already admitted the best man affair two weeks ago. But he has long been accused of fundamental misconduct due to family ties to organic associations – even if there are no verifiable rule violations at this point.
>> Read here: Habeck Ministry publishes details on links with Öko-Institut
But in the questioning in the committee, Graichen and Habeck put another posse under pressure. According to participants, Graichen had to defend himself because of a Handelsblatt report from last week, according to which the State Secretary wanted to borrow 60 employees from Dena.
There shouldn’t be an approved budget for it. It also seems questionable whether, with regard to conflicts of interest, it would be compatible for Dena employees to write draft legislation.
But Graichen’s plan failed in his own ranks. According to Handelsblatt information, State Secretary Anja Hajduk was skeptical from the start and fundamentally blocked the plan to loan the 60 employees. According to participants in the survey on Wednesday, she confirmed this and stated that the decision had been made “at the end of the first quarter, beginning of April” not to pursue the idea of hiring out staff.
Dena employees should help out in the ministry
Graichen had meticulously prepared his plan for months beforehand. This is suggested by the 20-page specifications from the Ministry of Economics. In it, the ministers detail how the Dena people should be deployed for various departments. An internal e-mail also states that Dena’s support should explicitly be “open to all three departments in the area of responsibility of State Secretary Graichen”.
In the gas department, for example, they should work on “technical issues in the LNG area”. In the electricity department, the “participation in the Energy Financing Act” was desired. And in the climate protection department, support for the “evaluation of suitable options for the use of climate-friendly fuels” was considered.
In general, it was about the “participation of the seconded specialists in internal processes and documents of the BMWK”. At the same time, the document devoted a single sentence to avoiding conflicts of interest: “The contractor must ensure that he […] is independent and not subject to any conflicts of interest.”
>> Read here: Patrick Graichen’s personnel acquisition raises new questions
In ministry circles it is said that the statement of work was the “more civilized version” of the attempt to use people from Dena. At first, Graichen acted “much more rustically”. He wanted to get people from Dena “on demand”. However, Dena has blocked itself.
The switch to the formal procedure is also associated with the change in the Dena supervisory board. In the middle of last year, Habeck appointed Stefan Wenzel, a new parliamentary state secretary, who also became head of the Dena supervisory board.
Wenzel always viewed the process with skepticism. On Tuesday evening he had confirmed his reservations with regard to budget law and the monitoring by the Federal Court of Auditors. Wenzel said: “It always has to be watertight.”
More: Designated Dena boss retires voluntarily