The new federal government plans to continue working in the security apparatus with heads of authorities and secret service heads with CDU party membership. The President of the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution, Thomas Haldenwang, 61, should keep his position. Haldenwang was appointed in November 2018 by Horst Seehofer (CSU) as the successor to the slain Hans-Georg Maaßen. Since then, his focus on the fight against right-wing extremism and his insistence on this area has occasionally been offended by Seehofer’s ministry, but had earned recognition among representatives of the SPD, the Greens and the FDP.
The President of the Federal Intelligence Service (BND), Bruno Kahl, 59, CDU member and long-time companion of Wolfgang Schäuble, is allowed to continue for the time being. Kahl was Schäuble’s spokesman during his time as Federal Minister of the Interior from 2005 to 2009. That was also a time of stricter security laws. Even as the head of the BND, Kahl, who is seen as a man with a clear, conservative profile, has received criticism from the SPD – most recently when it came to the withdrawal of western troops from Afghanistan and the German secret service’s assessment of the dynamism in the country.
A change is apparently pending at the head of the federal police. The current head of the 50,000-strong authority responsible for border protection and deportations, Dieter Romann, 59, was already known as a critic of refugee policy during Angela Merkel’s tenure. In the negotiations for a new federal police law in recent years, he has often offended the SPD. Two women are now being discussed to succeed him. On the one hand, there is Dagmar Busch, head of the Federal Police Department in the Ministry of the Interior since 2018. On the other hand, Barbara Slowik, who has been the police chief in the red-red-green governed Berlin since 2018.
There should also be a change in the parliamentary control of the intelligence services. The supervisory body of the Bundestag gets a new chairman to succeed Roderich Kiesewetter (CDU). This is to be voted on in the Bundestag on Thursday. The position is still being struggled with, Ulrich Grötsch (SPD) and Konstantin von Notz (Greens), who was previously vice-chairman of the committee, are competing.
The committee also includes a staff of around 20 employees, previously headed by the lawyer and CDU member Arne Schlatmann. Although Schlatmann, 57, gained non-partisan recognition in this position, he is to be replaced. On Monday he will return to the Ministry of the Interior, where he will be responsible for deportations as the head of the “Return staff”. A Social Democrat with long political experience and good contacts in the Chancellery is the successor.
In the Chancellery, State Secretary Johannes Geismann (CDU), who was previously responsible for the secret services, like BND boss Kahl, a long-time confidante of Schäuble, has already been replaced. His position will also not be filled, which the BND is optimistic about as an indication that the service should move closer to the Chancellor and the Head of the Chancellery. The previous head of the department for BND supervision, Merkel’s former vice-office manager Bernhard Kotsch, switched to the post of German ambassador to the Vatican in the summer. His successor is open.
There are still two items left. It comes as no surprise that the head of the Federal Criminal Police Office (BKA), Holger Münch, 60, should keep his position. Before Münch was appointed by the then CDU interior minister Thomas de Maizière in 2014, he had worked as a non-party state secretary under the SPD interior senator in Bremen. What is more surprising is that the so far only woman in the circle of intelligence chiefs, the head of the Military Counter-Intelligence Service (MAD), Martina Rosenberg, 50, has made a career as a close colleague of the CDU politician Ursula von der Leyen. But she also enjoys the trust of the new Minister Christine Lambrecht (SPD).