On April 11, Anne Spiegel, the German federal government minister, resigned voluntarily. The resignation of the Green Party politician is causing various controversies in German society regarding the work ethics of public officials. Spiegel was appointed Federal Minister of Family Affairs in December last year when the Greens joined the Social Democrats in a coalition government.
In July of last year, Minister Spiegel took a vacation to France during the four weeks of the great flood, which killed more than 180 people in 10 days, was reported in the daily Bild in early April and was criticized. At the time, he was the Environment Minister and Deputy Prime Minister of the Rhineland-Palatinate State, which suffered the most from flooding. There were even warnings that new flooding could occur when he left for his vacation. Floods have killed 135 people in the Rhineland-Palatinate.
German media reported extensively on Spiegel’s vacation. In particular, before leaving for his vacation, Spiegel showed strong sympathy for the flood damage in a broadcast interview. The message that Spiegel had with his department staff shortly after the flood was also problematic. He communicated to the staff of his department that he had to create an image so that responsibility for the flood damage would not fall on him. “Spigel’s vacation and personal image were more important than the unhappiness of the people in the affected area,” said Friedrich Merz, the leader of the CDU. In the end, Spiegel resigned voluntarily due to criticism from within the Green Party, pressure from coalition partners and public opinion.
Rather than the vacation itself, the lies spread around to get out of the situation caused the resignation. Following the controversy, Spiegel claimed to have attended cabinet meetings online while on vacation. But this turned out to be a lie. He admitted belatedly that he had planned to attend the meeting but did not. Most of the media considered Spiegel’s lie that he had attended an online meeting a serious problem. Politicians have taken this to the end.
Rather, various controversies arose over vacation, which was the problem in the first place. Spiegel cited the special circumstances of his family as the reason he had to go on vacation. He held a press conference to detail his family history. His husband, who suffered a stroke in 2019, needed constant stability, and the stress of his four children, who had to stay at home because school was blocked due to COVID-19, was also great. One child was a preschooler, and three were enrolled in the Grundschule, which is equivalent to the 4th grade of elementary school by Korean standards. “It was not easy to balance my responsibilities as a minister and as a mother of four,” Spiegel said, explaining the circumstances that forced him to go on vacation.
Various reactions followed. As women, mothers, and working women, there have been talks about the difficulties of balancing work and family, and criticism has also been raised of people giving up their personal lives and demanding excessive work and performance from high-ranking people in companies and governments. came out In a column titled ‘The Right to Breathe’, the weekly magazine ‘Chit’ argued that high-ranking officials in government or corporations have the right to take care of individual lives when organizational and individual difficulties come at the same time. Callum argued that it is harsh to criticize government officials for taking vacations in times of crisis unconditionally, and that they should be able to take vacations with the support of the organization’s system and colleagues. The column pointed out that in a situation where excessive work and performance were required, high-ranking personnel had no choice but to give up her family life, making it particularly difficult for women to pursue their careers or advance to senior positions.
A column in the daily also argued that it was necessary to re-examine the problems of occupation and women through Spiegel’s situation. The column pointed out that as high performance and responsibility are required at work, women with children are more likely to give up their jobs, and it is also difficult for men to take parental leave. Occasionally in Germany, the husband of a major female politician gives up his job and is praised for taking care of the family, but more importantly, he argues, that it is an environment in which she cannot give up life with her family, even in a senior position.
Spiegel’s press conference did not only evoke sympathy. Politicians are required to have different responsibilities than managers in private companies, and some critics have criticized that it is unreasonable to compare the flood with the general situation because it is a life-related issue. It was also pointed out that Der Spiegel tried to evade responsibility by using his family as a weapon, rather than accurately explaining his mistake or wrongdoing. Spiegel’s resignation statement was also criticized. In his statement, he said he was “resigning because of political pressure, and leaving because the work of the Ministry of Family Affairs, which has great political challenges, must not be harmed.” He did not comment on the mistakes he had made.
What ethics are required of public officials?
As Minister Spiegel’s whereabouts emerged as an issue, various cases of resignation of German politicians in the past have been re-examined. The case of Rudolf Zeytus, who resigned as Federal Interior Minister in 1993, drew attention as a responsible resignation. A problem arose when the police arrested Wolfgang Grams, a member of the then-armed far-left group “Red Army”. A gunfight broke out between the special police and Grams, and several police officers were seriously injured and Grams was killed. Although government officials said Grams committed suicide, some media outlets have suggested that the cause of his death was not suicide, and that special police officers deliberately shot him, who was already irresistible.
The Grams case drew public attention because it was linked to excessive police violence. The allegation that the police killed Grams was not proven, and Zeitus was not the one who directly ordered the police to arrive. However, as the controversy grew, he assumed all responsibilities as Interior Minister in charge of police affairs and resigned voluntarily despite opposition from Prime Minister Helmut Kohl.
On the other hand, chivalry politician Andreas Schoer, who served as Federal Transport Minister from 2018 to last year, was mentioned in the media as an example of not resigning despite clear political responsibilities. Schoer faced criticism after the German government’s plan to impose highway tolls on foreign vehicles in 2019 was ruled by the European Court of Justice in violation of anti-discrimination laws. Transport Minister Shoyer signed a contract with companies to install toll infrastructure during the trial. In addition, there was a contract in the contract that the government would have to pay a penalty to the company if the infrastructure installation did not proceed. In the end, the companies demanded a penalty of about 560 million euros. The media and politicians strongly clamored for Shoyer’s resignation, and according to a YouGov poll at the time, 60% of respondents supported Shoyer’s resignation. Opposition was only 13%. However, he remained in office until the end of his term. It was possible because the pressure to resign was not high within the government and the Knights Party at the time.
Plagiarism of papers, cheap loans, vacation expenses…
The business magazine Handelsblatt re-examined the representative scandals and resignations of former federal government officials immediately after the resignation of Spiegel. The most frequent problem was plagiarism. In recent years, there has been a case in which Franceska Gifai, who was the family minister of the 4th term of the Merkel government, resigned in May of last year after a controversy over plagiarism of his doctoral thesis in political science. Three weeks after his resignation, the Free University of Berlin forfeited his doctorate. However, in December of that year he became mayor of Berlin.
Defense Minister Rudolf Sharping, a former Social Democrat who resigned from the Schröder regime in 2002, is a representative bribery scandal. The problem was that Moritz Hunchinger, a PR consultant, paid for Sharping’s high-end suit and provided free private PR consulting for the defense minister. Hunqingeo has been mainly providing consulting that connects businesses and politicians, and has a defense industry as a customer. In addition, it was revealed that in the past, Sharping received a large fee for making a presentation at an event hosted by Hunqingeo. Sharping wasn’t the only politician involved with Hunchingo. Gem Özdemere of the Green Party, now the federal food and agriculture minister, was also involved in the 2002 measles outbreak. At the time, he had a problem by borrowing money from Hun Ching-eo at a lower interest rate than the market.
The case of Christian Bullf, who resigned from the presidency in 2012, is also a representative German politician bribery scandal. In 2008, while serving as Prime Minister of Lower Saxony, he was suspected of procuring low-interest-rate bonds from businessmen to finance the purchase of real estate. He was also accused of receiving vacation support from a film producer with whom he was acquainted. When it was revealed that Bullf made threatening phone calls to the media that reported these allegations, he received strong criticism. In the end, German prosecutors asked the Bundestag to remove the president’s immunity in order to prosecute Bullf, and Bullf resigned the next day. © EPN