Godfather case: Habeck with power word: Secretary of State Graichen stays

The Federal Minister of Economy and his State Secretary had to face an interrogation in the Bundestag. The work for the godfather was not the only subject.

10/05/2023 | Update: 5/10/2023 – 5:39 pm | by Julian Olk, Klaus Stratmann and Thomas Sigmund

Patrick Graichen (left), Robert Habeck © dpa

Berlin Robert Habeck started to run but stopped again. His State Secretary Patrick Graichen managed to enter the SPD parliamentary group hall alongside him at the same height. It was an attempted unity signal. Habeck and Graichen are side by side, despite all the resignations.

But the pressure on the Federal Economy Minister and his top officials is immense. The economy and energy and climate protection committees summoned the minister and his top officials to a survey on Wednesday afternoon. The reason: Graichen helped his godfather Michael Schäfer land a lucrative job as head of the German Energy Agency (Dena) and kept their personal relationship a secret.

The extraordinary agenda in the Bundestag required extraordinary premises. In order to accommodate all committee members, they moved to the SPD parliamentary group hall. For nearly two and a half hours, deputies Habeck and Graichen peppered questions. Opposition and sectors of the FDP attacked. The greens tried to defend themselves.

But Economy Minister Habeck’s party has been in trouble for a long time. At previous committee meetings, it was decided whether the interrogation of Habeck and Graichen should take place in public. The Greens, participants report, did not vote evenly. In both committees, the majority ended up voting against holding a public meeting and only for the timely publication of the minutes of the meeting.

At the beginning of the session, it was Habeck himself who lamented the lack of an audience. The Union requested a new vote, but the result remained the same. The opposition, as well as the SPD and FDP behind closed doors, assessed the Greens’ preparations as unprofessional.

Greens surprise coalition partners

According to Handelsblatt information, the Greens had only suggested to the coalition partners at eight in the morning that the special session be held in public as an exception. SPD and FDP felt caught off guard, committee meetings are generally not public.

The research didn’t yield any fundamentally new insights into Graichen’s misconduct in filling the Dena post — but interesting details. Graichen said he knew eight more of the eleven candidates. The fact that his godfather was there was only a “gradual” difference.

Economy Minister Robert Habeck and President of Dena Management Andreas Kuhlmann © dpa

In job interviews, Graichen used to address all candidates, he would have explained, according to participants. Furthermore, his vote alone was not decisive in the three-person selection committee.

Graichen admitted that he should have resigned from the Commission. He “repents and regrets” the wrong. These declarations were not enough for the Union. She wants to request another interrogation of Habeck and Graichen, this time publicly. Julia Klöckner, economic policy spokeswoman for the CDU/CSU, renewed her call for Graichen’s resignation. The Secretary of State misled Habeck: “That’s why we think there should be consequences.”

Other inconsistencies put Graichen under pressure

Habeck defended his secretary of state after the meeting. “I’ve decided that Patrick Graichen doesn’t have to go because of this mistake,” the vice-chancellor said in front of the television cameras, as Graichen disappeared into the elevator behind him without saying a word. Habeck asked the opposition not to mix the “error” of the Dena process with other things: “There was a web of untruths and innuendos”.

The accusations against Graichen are manifold. He had already admitted to his godfather’s affair two weeks ago. But he has long been accused of fundamental misconduct due to family ties to organic associations – even if there are no verifiable rule violations at this point.

But in the interrogation in the committee, Graichen and Habeck put another platoon under pressure. According to the participants, Graichen had to defend himself because of a Handelsblatt report last week, according to which the Secretary of State wanted to borrow 60 employees from Dena.

There shouldn’t be an approved budget for this. It also seems questionable whether, with regard to conflicts of interest, it would be acceptable for Dena officials to draft bills.

But Graichen’s plan failed in his own ranks. According to information from Handelsblatt, Secretary of State Anja Hajduk was skeptical from the start and fundamentally blocked the plan to borrow the 60 employees. According to participants in Wednesday’s survey, she confirmed this and said the decision had been taken “at the end of the first quarter, beginning of April” not to go ahead with the idea of ​​hiring staff.

Dena employees should help in the ministry

Graichen had meticulously prepared his plan months before. This is suggested by the Ministry of Economy’s 20-page specifications. In it, the ministers detail how Dena staff should be allocated to different secretariats. An internal email also states that Dena’s support must be explicitly “open to all three departments in the area of ​​responsibility of Secretary of State Graichen”.

In the gas department, for example, they will have to work on “technical issues in the area of ​​LNG”. In the electricity department, “participation in the Energy Financing Law” was desired. And in the climate protection department, support for the “assessment of suitable options for the use of environmentally friendly fuels” was considered.

In general, it was about the “participation of experts highlighted in BMWK’s internal processes and documents”. At the same time, the document devoted a single sentence to avoiding conflicts of interest: “The contractor must ensure that […] is independent and not subject to any conflicts of interest.”

In ministerial circles, it is said that the statement of work was the “more civilized version” of the attempt to use people from Dena. At first, Graichen acted “much more rustically”. He wanted to receive people from Dena “on demand”. However, Dena blocked herself.

The change to the formal procedure is also associated with the change in Dena’s supervisory board. In the middle of last year, Habeck appointed Stefan Wenzel, a new parliamentary secretary of state, who also became head of the DENA supervisory board.

Wenzel has always viewed the process with skepticism. On Tuesday night, he had confirmed his reservations regarding the budget law and oversight by the Federal Court of Accounts. Wenzel said: “It always has to be watertight.”