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Fried – view from Berlin
Chancellor in flood: What Gerhard Schröder did better than Olaf Scholz
Chancellor Olaf Scholz (l.) visits the flood-affected town of Oberröblingen at the beginning of January
© Hans Christian Plambeck/laif
Floods in Germany: Everyone remembers Gerhard Schröder’s rubber boots. But his true political courage was shown elsewhere.
There are certain reasons why the SPD is at odds with Gerhard Schröder. However, the last Social Democratic chancellor before Olaf Scholz did rule in an exemplary manner here and there. For example, in 2002, numerous rivers in East Germany overflowed their banks and devastated entire towns, which happened to happen at a time when Schröder was up to his neck politically. The Chancellor made a courageous decision back then – and by that I don’t mean that he trudged through destroyed towns in rubber boots. More on that soon.
But the rubber boots! Yes, they are remembered. Perhaps Schröder’s black ones wouldn’t have been so noticeable if Saxony’s Prime Minister Georg Milbradt hadn’t been wearing bright yellow ones, which initially drew attention to the politicians’ shoes. With his appearance, Schröder gained an advantage over Edmund Stoiber in the election campaign: his competitor was on vacation in Juist, while the Chancellor acted like he was caring and walked grimly through Grimma.
Gerhard Schröder (l.) and Saxony’s then Prime Minister Georg Milbradt (r.) walk through the flooded streets of the small Saxon town of Grimma on August 14, 2002
© Sebastian Willnow/ddp
Floods are considered natural events where political careers can take off or reach their peak. Helmut Schmidt should be mentioned, whose management of the Hamburg storm surge also helped with his political rise in Bonn. Family Minister Anne Spiegel, on the other hand, lost her Berlin office in 2022 due to her absence as state minister after the Ahr Valley flood. Matthias Platzeck, as Brandenburg’s environment minister, became dike chief during the Oder flood in 1997, was able to stabilize the Oder river, but not the SPD, of which he was later briefly head.
By the way, the Oder flood is a good example of the fact that you don’t automatically remain chancellor if you show up in flooded regions: Helmut Kohl visited the dike in Ratzdorf in 1997 and was still voted out a year later. It doesn’t seem plausible that this was only because he wasn’t wearing rubber boots. Angela Merkel cruised in 2013 Saxony, Thuringia and Bavaria also only wore sturdy shoes and still won the election a few months later.
Scholz promised help, but there is no money in the budget
Which brings us to Olaf Scholz. At the turn of the year, the Chancellor visited flood areas twice within a few days, in Lower Saxony and then in Saxony-Anhalt. First he came in Merkel shoes. But they weren’t strong enough to walk on water following other models, or even at least through water, which is why Scholz didn’t really get into conversation with those affected. The second time he wore rubber boots. But now those affected were not very friendly to him.
Scholz promised help: “We won’t leave anyone alone.” The only problem is that there is actually no money in the budget for this. Here we are again with Gerhard Schröder. In 2002 he relied on the solidarity of the Germans and decided to simply postpone a reduction in income tax that had been decided for 2003 in order to finance the flood relief. In addition, he asked companies to pay through the capital tax. That brought in around seven billion euros. And now imagine the gasps in the FDP, the Union, among company bosses and possibly also among farmers and other downtrodden people if Olaf Scholz suggested something similar today.
Incidentally, Gerhard Schröder defended the Chancellery in 2002 despite this tax policy. Maybe even because of her – and not because of the damn rubber boots.