On Monday evening Angela Merkel received the highest German award, the Grand Cross in a special version. The former chancellor used her acceptance speech for emotional words.
When a medal is awarded in Germany, even if it is the highest honor that the country has to bestow, then of course it is done with law and order and above all it is one thing – sober: 31 chairs were neatly placed in front of the lectern by Frank- Walter Steinmeier lined up in Bellevue Palace. One for Angela Merkel, 30 for her guests.
In addition to her family – husband Joachim Sauer, his son Daniel and her siblings Irene and Marcus Kasner – Merkel had invited around 20 guests: Olaf Scholz (SPD), EU Commission President and Merkel’s confidante Ursula von der Leyen (CDU), her former head of the Chancellery Thomas de Maizière, Ronald Pofalla, Peter Altmaier and Helge Braun (all CDU), their longtime confidant Annette Schavan (CDU) and their government spokesman and current ambassador to Israel, Steffen Seibert.
Merkel’s close adviser Eva Christiansen, the former GDR civil rights activist Rainer Eppelmann, the actor Ulrich Matthes, the chairman of the Ethics Council, Alena Buyx, ex-national coach Jürgen Klinsmann, the art historians Neil MacGregor and Horst Bredekamp and the chemistry professors Robert Schlögl and Helmut Schwarz also met shortly before 6 p.m. at Bellevue Palace. Merkel’s confidants Beate Baumann, former Vice Chancellor and ex-SPD leader Franz Müntefering, both of whom had to cancel due to illness, and former Union faction leader Volker Kauder, who was unable to attend, were invited but not present.
Steinmeier: “Enormous condition”
The place for the extraordinary ceremony was so sober as it was designed at first: Shortly after six o’clock, her guests entered the hall in silence and hurried to their seats. Shortly thereafter, Angela Merkel (in a dark mauve jacket) at the side of Chancellor Olaf Scholz, Frank-Walter Steinmeier and his wife Elke Büdenbender followed and took their seats. It would be a miracle if Merkel had had the time to at least take a quick look around at this moment. Steinmeier did not lose a second before beginning his eulogy.
In it, the Federal President praised Angela Merkel above all for her great sense of duty, her “power to correct herself”, her “great physical condition and an enormous amount of self-discipline”, their style of government with “ambition, self-discipline and seemingly limitless resilience”. He emphasized that she had never put herself in the center. “Every vanity, every flattery, every fuss about herself was repugnant to her.” The fact that Merkel was the first woman and an East German to take office was good for the country: “With your chancellorship, you have ensured that a woman will always be at the head of the government, that female power will always be a matter of course in our country. “
Merkel on her husband: “He had to endure a lot”
Merkel found her very own way of saying thank you – and cleverly turned her acceptance speech into a little personal journey through her life. She explained how she chose her guests – and earned many a laugh. She said of her four ministers in the Chancellery: “One could say that none of them lasted longer than four years.”
Müntefering, whom she wished a speedy recovery from afar, told her before she was sworn in in the Bundestag in 2005: “It’ll be fine. That helped me.” Ulrich Matthes taught her the art of speaking “a little bit” and the invited scientists gave her a different view of the world that she couldn’t find in politics.
In her short acceptance speech, Merkel became emotional for a few moments: it was a pity that her parents could not experience this moment. She is all the more pleased that her siblings and her husband’s son, Daniel, could be there. And a bit unexpectedly, almost atypically, she allowed herself a short personal moment: “Of course I thank my husband: he had to endure a lot, to go through a lot. Fortunately, he has his own passion: science. That sometimes helped, I think. “
