of course, it is the day of Olaf Scholz, 63. The first Federal Chancellor after 16 years, Angela Merkel. The fourth Social Democrat at the head of the Federal German government after Willy Brandt, Helmut Schmidt, Gerhard Schröder. Today he is appointed, “Cum-Ex” is only a distant shadow from the Hanseatic business days: So much change, so much progress has not been in the political central camp of the republic for a long time, and the world is writing greetings cards, sometimes in Sütterlin .
Like his predecessor, Scholz will “work calmly, thoroughly and focused on the huge tasks,” explains Christine Lagarde, President of the European Central Bank. And Gerhard Schröder believes in the leadership of the successor. He sees the chance for a “reform coalition”, as with the social-liberal coalition in 1969, and – you guessed it for a long time – in his own term of office (1998-2005).
My colleagues Martin Greive, Jan Hildebrand and Thomas Sigmund modeled the appointment of Chancellor this Wednesday in a brilliant portrait. Here a power-conscious lawyer comes to the fore, whose Adlatus Wolfgang Schmidt spoke of the plan for the Chancellery as early as 2018. Schröder once rattled the fence of the seat of government in tranquil Bonn and shouted, drunk with joy: “I want to get in here!”
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This chancellor is flexible in his vita, as bendable as a reed: sometimes ardent Marxist, sometimes Agenda 2010 drummer, sometimes law and order senator, sometimes minimum wage reformer, sometimes black zero, sometimes red billion. Olaf Scholz always remained a political enigma. Someone who at times was more convinced of himself than of his party – even if he was almost everywhere considered to be a bore on the job. Lars Klingbeil, soon to be head of the SPD: “Whenever I explained why he still wanted to become Chancellor, all the journalists put the pens down.” They forgot Rudolf Augstein: “Write what is”.
Until now it was thought that the green Robert Habeck was the great climate minister of the republic. But now, lo and behold, his co-boss Annalena Baerbock, nominally responsible for foreign affairs, is also a bit of a climate minister. The politician is bringing the responsibilities for international climate policy into her house, reports the “Süddeutsche Zeitung”. So far, they have been with the Federal Environment Ministry, which will be led in the future by the green Steffi Lemke.
Foreign climate policy has become recognizably more important for the Ampel coalition, also because of the moralization requirement. The latest maneuver makes Baerbock German chief negotiator at the UN climate conference. It should also build international climate partnerships. France emerges as a role model: There, responsibility for foreign climate policy has been with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs for several years.
With the usual mix of responsibility and guilt, Health Minister Jens Spahn said goodbye to the people on ZDF yesterday. “I would have liked to have remained a minister,” he said on the one hand. On the other hand, he confessed that he understood the frustration in doctors’ offices because the vaccine was missing: “I can only apologize for that.”
Incidentally, his successor Karl Lauterbach has his cell phone number. But whether the Social Democrat, who once wore a bow tie for recognition, will often enter this sequence of digits, is doubtful. With the exception of Horst Seehofer (CSU), no German health minister has made a political career after the end of his service. The office is big, lobby groups regularly ask for coffee appointments, the subject is complicated.
Yesterday in the Bundestag, doctor Lauterbach was in alarm mode, everything as usual: If the Omikron variant of the coronavirus combined the vaccination rate that was too low with a faster spread, there would be “no further lockdown”.
(Photo: imago images / ZUMA Wire)
Porsche, the sports car, has always been the fate of Porsche, the engineering family. In this clan one could only regret, like Ferdinand Karl Piëch (1937-2019), not to be called Porsche, which meant that under his aegis as VW patron, the eternally youthful brand became part of the Wolfsburg-based group. At the time, it was necessary to fend off Wendelin Wiedeking, the Stuttgart Porsche CEO, who was too intoxicated by stock market games and who entered the Mittelland Canal like Julius Caesar von der Alb.
Now the role backwards: The Porsche / Piëch dynasty wants to acquire the largest possible block of shares in the upcoming IPO of Porsche AG – through Porsche Automobil Holding SE, where they hold the majority. The sale of a large block of VW shares should provide the necessary financial resources for this deal. A calculation that only works if Group CEO Herbert Diess does not get lost in any capers about money and validity.
(Photo: AP)
And then there is Angela Merkel, today Federal Chancellor, tomorrow a retired politician after 30 years in the Bundestag. She is moving to “Margot Honecker’s office” on Unter den Linden 71, she tells her Union faction. To the place where the GDR minister of education once resided and later Helmut Kohl after 16 years as chancellor. A historical place for the “settlement of ongoing obligations”, as the office work is called in the case of a retired head of government. A Konrad Adenauer picture has already moved with it.
And in parting, Merkel gave the unusual advice: “Be smart!” With me on the way. She did not come up with the crises herself and then brought them to the parliamentary group that crises would remain “if I am no longer Chancellor”. When we’re finished with this topic, let’s enjoy the start of the day with Heinrich Heine: “A clever person notices everything, a stupid one makes a comment about everything.”
I hope you have an instructive day, may the remark be made.
I warmly greet you
you
Hans-Jürgen Jakobs
Senior editor
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