Does Robert Habeck lead his ministry along “clan structures”? The opposition claims that. And at least one mistake is now dangerous for the Vice Chancellor.
The most important things at a glance
Everything back to go. So Robert Habeck obviously wants to tick off the unpleasant affair that has been following him for more than a week. And which is described by critics and the opposition as “green clan structures”, “mafia-like tendencies” or simply “nepotism”.
In the most recent and clearest case, the first consequences are now becoming apparent. According to t-online information, the chairman of the supervisory board of the German energy agency, Dena, assumes that the supervisory board will decide on a completely new selection process for the top position at the federal agency.
It had previously become known that one of Habeck’s most important employees, State Secretary Patrick Graichen, was involved in the selection process that ultimately gave Graichen’s best man the top job at Dena.
Why is?
One could say: for dear relatives. And about what they do or could do for each other professionally. Basically, Habeck has gathered a few close employees in his Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Protection, the BMWK, some of whom have family or other relationships with each other and some with important environmental organizations.
At the center of this network are many Graichens. Habeck’s probably most important official, State Secretary Patrick Graichen, who is responsible for the energy transition, has a sister Verena and a brother Jakob.
Verena Graichen is married to Habeck’s Parliamentary State Secretary Michael Kellner. She is deputy head of the environmental association BUND and, like Jakob Graichen, works for the Öko-Institut, which also produces studies on behalf of the BMWK. Patrick Graichen himself used to be the head of the think tank Agora Energiewende, which planned large parts of the German energy transition and helped shape it in an advisory capacity.
And there are other connections to institutes and associations that deal with topics that the ministry also deals with (see graphic). That’s the general, fundamental level of the affair.
On a concrete level, it is about the federal German Energy Agency, Dena, and the selection process for the top post. Habeck’s State Secretary Patrick Graichen sat there on the selection committee.
Graichen was thus involved in the decision of this commission to select Michael Schäfer as the candidate “with the best qualifications”. The problem: Schäfer and Graichen not only know each other, the chief candidate was even the State Secretary’s best man.
How did it come about?
The family relationships in Habeck’s ministry were no secret from the start. Even when the traffic light government took office at the end of 2021, the “taz” reported extensively on the Graichens in the Ministry of Climate. The headline: “Energy transition as a family project”. The story did not initially trigger a major uproar.
That changed when a columnist in “Spiegel” rewrote the known facts just over a week ago, on April 22, under the title “Habeck’s Klüngelwirtschaft”. Other media took up the topic, and political criticism of the family relationships in Habeck’s house began.
After this renewed reporting, Patrick Graichen informed his boss Robert Habeck on April 24, according to the BMWK, that the designated Dena boss Michael Schäfer was his best man. Habeck then arranged for the selection process to be reviewed on April 24th.
Are the relationships fundamentally problematic?
Opinions differ on this. The opposition considers it problematic. One argument would be that a federal ministry has to avoid any appearance of nepotism, especially when it comes to top positions and valuable contracts.
The counter-argument would be roughly put: people fall in love, and not infrequently in the workplace (and in the green movement). Timo Lange, campaign manager for the anti-corruption agency Lobbycontrol, said to “Zeit Online”: “It is initially unavoidable that family members work in different associations and organizations that touch each other professionally.” However, he criticizes that there have been “many missed opportunities to create transparency” in the ministry.
