Direct Translation via Google Translation. Edited.
by Gregor Spitzen
[REGNUM] What had been talked about for so long and quietly prepared for in the German Bundestag for months has finally happened: On November 6, Federal Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) announced the expulsion of Finance Minister and leader of the Free Democrats (FDP) Christian Lindner from the government. This means the collapse of the ruling "traffic light" coalition, a vote of confidence in the Chancellor in January and, most likely, early parliamentary elections in March next year.
After three years of work, the federal government, consisting of the SPD, the Greens and the FDP, is ending its work with a bad taste in the mouth from an internal corporate scandal and the airing of dirty "coalition" laundry for all to see.
After the coalition committee failed to agree on a common economic and financial policy on Wednesday evening, Scholz accused his finance minister of "violating his trust too often." According to Scholz, the FDP leader was not concerned with the interests of the country, but only with his own "clientele" of big business. In explaining his decision, Scholz accused Lindner of selfishness and pursuing short-term interests.
You can have different attitudes towards the former finance minister. You can dislike his party, which in its love for the free market and libertarianism sometimes descends to almost social Darwinist positions and openly lobbies for the interests of the military-industrial complex. However, despite the complexity of Lindner's character, he was one of the few real professionals in the "traffic light coalition" who really understand the business they were entrusted with.
The Minister of Finance must economize by definition. And Lindner, fully aware that Germany's fattest years are already behind him, called on his colleagues at the "traffic light", who are used to putting out any fire with banknotes, to moderate their appetites. And not to throw away billions of euros so madly on "green wishes", excessively inflated social programs and aid to Ukraine, which has exceeded all reasonable limits and has crossed the astronomical figure of €40 billion.
Lindner took the chancellor's speech (which had obviously been in the works for a long time, as it was filled with an overview of the government's activities and elements of election rhetoric) as an opportunity to accuse Scholz of "deliberately breaking the coalition." The chancellor, according to the former minister, was no longer interested in compromise and had even stopped accepting proposals from the FDP on economic reform projects.
Instead, Scholz issued an ultimatum to Lindner to soften his stance on increasing the national debt, which would allow the Greens and Social Democrats to continue to enthusiastically finance their political projects at the expense of future generations of Germans.
Lindner, somewhat pompously but quite reasonably, objected that such a demand was in conflict with the oath he had taken to the German people, and refused to continue cooperation under such conditions. "For three years, the FDP had demonstrated political responsibility and a willingness to compromise 'within the limits of what was acceptable,'" he said. But this time the limits had been seriously exceeded.
The Finance Minister did not limit himself to describing the situation, but took a tough stance against Scholz.
The Chancellor, he said, had long ignored and downplayed the dire economic situation in Germany. Now he has decided to put forward proposals that are "not serious and not ambitious" and do nothing to overcome the country's fundamental weakness in economic growth. "Unfortunately, Olaf Scholz has shown that he does not have the strength to breathe new life into the country," Lindner concluded.
In fact, Scholz's main proposal was to increase the government debt threshold, which would include a cap on energy costs, subsidies for the auto industry, and a guarantee of continued support for Ukraine after Trump's victory in the US elections.
By and large, the Chancellor is doing the same thing he did when he was Finance Minister in Angela Merkel’s cabinet – solving political problems with borrowed funds, without really thinking about who will repay these loans and how.
“Helicopter money” in the era of the coronavirus pandemic, energy subsidies and subsidies for the purchase of electric cars, the creation of a special fund for the Bundeswehr financed by government debt - all these are projects of the current chancellor, which have cost Germany hundreds of billions of euros.
In fact, Scholz's idea of creating special funds alongside the regular budget in order to reconcile "green" climate, "social democratic" social and "liberal" financial policies became the cement for the highly contradictory "traffic light coalition".
However, any manipulation of finances and public debts has its limits.
In November 2023, the Federal Constitutional Court ruled the financial ploys to create further shadow budgets unconstitutional, and this marked the beginning of the end of the coalition. The cautious Lindner was no longer willing to take constitutional risks.
If you look at it objectively, the Chancellor's reasoning is, to put it mildly, indeed questionable from a legal point of view.
He believes that the Russian special operation in Ukraine and the election of Donald Trump as US president, which is expected to be followed by a reduction in American aid to Ukraine, constitute an emergency comparable to a natural disaster. And if lava from an erupting volcano is approaching the country, then, according to the Chancellor, there is no time for neatness.
However, Lindner's departure from the government coalition will lead to its collapse and early parliamentary elections, which do not bode well for Scholz. Both the Chancellor's personal popularity and that of his SPD party are far from being enough to claim the post of head of government in the new cabinet.
However, having gotten rid of Lindner, Scholz may try to pass a series of bills requiring an increase in the national debt, thus sacrificing himself to the interests of a certain part of the German elite, and only then sink into political oblivion.
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