The protest was loud. But considering that three large organizations – the Farmers’ Association, the Gastronomy Association and the Bavarian Business Association (vbw) – had called for it, it remained manageable. Around 350 demonstrators greeted Federal Economics Minister Robert Habeck on Thursday evening at Nuremberg’s main market with decisive chants of “Go away” and whistles.
When the citizen dialogue with the Green politician began a little later in the atrium of the adjacent Chamber of Commerce and Industry (IHK), he was greeted by distant silence. Not a hand moved to applaud when Habeck entered the hall. An hour and a half later, some CSU members among the entrepreneurs even took a selfie with the minister and vice-chancellor.
According to the police, around 350 people gathered for the rally at the main market.
(Photo: Daniel Vogl/dpa)
There were 120 places available Nuremberg News was raffled off, and invited grandees from the Chamber of Industry and Commerce were also invited. Anyone could ask questions and criticize; Entrepreneurs in particular took advantage of the opportunity. High energy prices, a shortage of skilled workers, excessive bureaucracy, the compatibility of family and work – surprising topics rarely came up, such as the complaint of a vegetable and garden farmer about the sub-sector recognition for the reimbursement of the CO₂ tax, which has not been processed by the Ministry of Economic Affairs for a year and a half. “The topic has never passed me by,” Habeck said openly, asked the man for his email address and promised him that he would take care of it next week.
This set the mutual tone of the evening: calm, objective, listening to the other person, letting them express themselves, a respectful tone. A conscious contrast to the excited, heated and contemptuous political manners that are rampant. That’s exactly what they liked, said Ulrike and Matthias Richter, two of the normal people drawn for the citizens’ dialogue. “Always this wild firing from Mr. Söder and others – that’s nothing. I thought Mr. Habeck’s objectivity was very good and that he calmly explained his point of view,” said Matthias Richter.
The distrust with which business representatives view this government and the minister responsible for it was palpable. Right at the beginning, IHK President Armin Zitzmann packaged his “big worries” with a gift to Habeck, a silver-colored figure of Ludwig Erhard, “our favorite economics minister.” The reminiscence of Erhard was not just local patriotism, given his origins from Nuremberg’s neighboring city of Fürth. It was intended as a pointer: Habeck, look here, this is how it works! He used the tip as a template and lectured about the principle behind Erhard’s much-praised social market economy: a society with “less polemics and more peace-building discourse”. This “actual guiding idea has been somewhat lost to us”. There was greater applause in the hall for the first time.
After his tour of East German cities and companies, Habeck came to an economic area that is often underestimated in the rest of the republic. The Nuremberg metropolitan region is prospering; With a gross domestic product of 130 billion euros, it generates more than Hungary or all the Baltic states combined. Zitzmann calculated that the number of patent applications was twice as high as the national average. Today, the former industrial region of Nuremberg is characterized by a dense network of universities and research institutions.
Because Franconians can also be friendly, in the first speech a woman thanked Habeck for the energy supply that has now been secured for the second winter. Speaking of energy: prices are falling, Habeck calculated, and companies will soon be affected by this. And yes, it is true that there are still European countries that would buy Russian gas, oil and even uranium for their nuclear power plants, which, by the way, is not prohibited by sanctions. “The Germans definitely don’t do that.”
Habeck also played balls back sharply. As with the restaurateur who complained that he could employ “ten Ukrainians in one fell swoop,” German bureaucracy would not prevent that. That was wrong, the minister replied; of course he could hire the people straight away. And one more thing: There are large companies that ultimately demand subsidies from the government as a reward if they do not invest in the USA. Habeck literally: “What kind of shit is this?”
And the demonstrations outside the door? The cancellation of a Green event on Ash Wednesday in Biberach for security reasons? A politician must be able to endure demonstrations, said Habeck. But “something has started to slip. If demonstrations prevent conversations and events are canceled, that misses the democratic spirit.”
Habeck was asked on the way out what he was taking with him from Nuremberg. “Unrest and worry about where the country is going,” he replies. How did he feel about the evening? He felt “curious attention,” “a shared reflection and an exchange process.” Spoken and left the IHK building. By then the demonstrators had already gone home.