The government wants a quick end to Gerhard Schröder’s chancellor privileges. According to a new traffic light application, the SPD politician is to lose his office as former chancellor as early as Thursday – because he refuses to resign from his jobs for Russian companies.
There have been demands for weeks, the internal discussions were long – but now it should go very quickly: According to information from “Spiegel”, the governing coalition of SPD, Greens and FDP has agreed to give the controversial former Chancellor Gerhard Schröder the to cut employees.
In an application that is available to the magazine and which is to be presented on Wednesday, it is stated that the positions previously occupied by Schröder’s office should no longer be filled from Thursday onwards. Instead, the remaining staff should handle the tasks and then be deployed outside Schröder’s office. The former chancellor should be allowed to keep his personal protection. And Schröder’s pension, which the CDU and CSU are calling for to be abolished, remains untouched.
Several of Schröder’s employees had already resigned in protest at his attitude towards Russia. The ex-chancellor’s personnel costs were recently around 400,000 euros per year – financed from taxpayers’ money. The traffic light’s motion comes in response to Schröder’s refusal to resign from his senior positions in several Russian corporations, even though Russia launched a war of aggression against Ukraine.
It is expected that the motion will get a majority in the budget committee. However, it is unclear whether he will be legally secure – and also whether Schröder will defend himself legally against it.
