COVID corruption scandal hounds Angela Merkel's CDU/CSU
Germany's latest political scandal is directly tied to
the coronavirus pandemic: Two conservative politicians received
kickbacks for brokering mask deals. For their parties, the timing could
scarcely be worse.
Two politicians are accused of receiving six-figure kickbacks after
recommending manufacturers of facemasks to the federal government
The scandal engulfing Angela Merkel's conservative bloc comes at an
unfortunate time for the Christian Democrats (CDU): On Sunday, state
elections will take place in Baden-Württemberg and Rhineland-Palatinate.
The Bundestag members Nikolas Löbel, of the CDU, and Georg Nüsslein, of the allied Bavarian Christian Social Union (CSU), have both resigned from their respective parties. after
being accused of receiving six-figure kickbacks for recommending
manufacturers of masks to the federal government or of brokering
business between companies as part of the drive to acquire more masks.
Roughly
a year ago, early in the pandemic, masks were in short supply and at a
premium — prices went through the roof briefly. At this point, there was
quick money to be made on the back of a crisis. German prosecutors are
investigating both politicians.
Löbel said he should have conducted his "commercial dealings with greater sensitivity"
Löbel, from Mannheim, quit the CDU and also gave up his seat in the Bundestag. Speaking to the conservative daily Die Welt, he admitted to having made an error.
"As
a member of the Bundestag, and particularly in the specific backdrop of
the pandemic, I should have conducted my commercial dealings with
greater sensitivity," Löbel said. He is suspected of having received
€250,000 ($297,000) in kickbacks.
But Nüsslein is adopting a
different take on things. He has quit Bavaria's CSU parliamentary party
while saying he intends to retain his seat as an independent for now, to
the fury of some CSU colleagues.
Markus Blume, the general
secretary of the CSU, told ARD television that he was relieved by
Nüsslein's quitting: "This step was unavoidable, also to limit the
damage on the party itself."
Greens keep the pressure on
The
opposition does not seem satisfied by the two parliamentarians falling
on their swords. For the Green party co-chair Robert Habeck, the
scandal's tied to the 15 long years in power for the CDU/CSU led by
Angela Merkel. For Habeck, especially a year ago with the pandemic
ramping up, CDU Health Minister Jens Spahn was the first port of call
for many companies thinking they could help.
And, of course, conservative politicians tend to have a better line for business contacts than politicians of other stripes.
"Secondly,
though, there is simply a particular closeness to economic activity and
a lacking conscience on whether financial transactions are perhaps not
appropriate," Habeck said.
The mask scandal does hark back, among other things, to the difficulties faced by the CDU parliamentarian Philipp Amthor.
Up until May 2019, he was active for Augustus Intelligence, lobbying
CDU Economy Minister Peter Altmaier and other politicians on the US
company's behalf.
The 29-year-old politician initially insisted
that he'd been paid no salary. But gradually, he had to concede that,
yes, he had received stock options in the company worth up to $250,000.
He also accepted help with travel expenses.
Despite the reports, Amthor was appointed the top candidate for the CDU in the state of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania.
Amthor is the top CDU candidate in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania
Combating corruption
The Social Democrats (SPD) have also weighed in with demands for conservative rivals and coalition allies.
"It
must be incumbent on all democrats that greed and cronyism are given no
chance in our parliament," SPD party co-chair Norbert Walter-Borjans
said.
A transparency or lobbying register
should help in the future to shed more light on the shadier areas where
politics and business collide. Fundamentally, after a long period of
arguing over the specifics, the CDU/CSU and the SPD now agree on this
plan.
In the future, lobbyists will be required to sign a log
and to give details on their employers or the companies that
commissioned them. This will also apply to lobbyists seeking to
influence ministries or the federal government. Previously, this extra
step had faced resistance and was not included in an earlier draft of
the plan.
The anti-corruption NGO Transparency International demands that certain forms of lobbying be outlawed altogether.
"The
rules of procedure in the Bundestag need to be expanded and need to
explicitly sanction certain forms of lobbying, as in the cases of
Nüsslein and Löbel," Transparency's chairman in Germany, Hartmut Bäumer,
told Funke Mediengruppe newspapers.
And the pro-business Free
Democrats are not satisfied with these proposals. Party leader Christian
Lindner is calling for an independent person to investigate the
reports.
"A special investigator, so a former judge, should
check behind the scenes whether everything that happened was legal —
with access to the case files," Lindner told ARD. "Only after that
should they inform us, and then the public."
The conservatives might have to brace themselves for further losses in Sunday's regional elections as a result of the scandals.
The
increasing dissatisfaction with the government's pandemic handling, not
least the slower start to vaccinating, had already led to losses for
the CDU in recent weeks in two of Germany's most significant states.
This article has been translated from German.
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