ZDF Magazine Royale
“Ahoy, Sailors”: Jan Böhmermann takes on seafaring – and shows serious abuses
TV presenter and satirist Jan Böhmermann takes on German shipping in the current episode of his show.
© Henning Kaiser / DPA
“A sea voyage is fun, a sea voyage is beautiful”: TV presenter Jan Böhmermann starts the current episode of his late-night show with swaying music. But it doesn’t stay that shaky for long – it’s about the shallows of German shipping.
Gazing out at the open sea has been shown to have a calming effect on us. With good reason, most Germans are drawn to the water for vacation. But the current episode of Jan Böhmermann’s late-night show “ZDF Magazin Royale” is unlikely to have a relaxing effect on anyone who dreams of great seafaring romance. This time, the satirist took a closer look at shipping in Germany – and provides insights into the world of shipping companies, which have absolutely nothing romantic about them. But from the front.
Right at the beginning of the episode, it is noticeable that Böhmermann is particularly patriotic this time: he greets his guests with the German flag in his hand. After a short, seemingly patriotic speech, the presenter comes straight to the core topic of the episode: With a maritime sailor’s hat on his head, he strikes up a sea shanty – and announces that it’s going to the high seas.
Germany relies on shipping
But not in the romantic, relaxing way: “Seafaring is much more than gourmet filet Bordelaise and 14 days all-inclusive vacation.” Instead, he proudly holds up a lifebelt from the “MS Albatross”, a former film ship of the Bavarian Broadcasting Corporation, which he bought for almost 300 euros – in India. Without explaining how he got the prop from India, he goes straight to the heart of the matter: As an export country, Germany needs seafaring, which is considered fast, efficient and cheap.
Why? The moderator has an assumption: “On the high seas there is no climate glue.” The fact is therefore: 90 percent of everything was at some point on a ship. Germany has 12.5 percent of the world’s container ship capacities and is therefore in place two in the world ranking, or as Böhmermann puts it: “Germany is the runner-up in container shipping capacity.”
Although this all sounds positive at first glance, it quickly becomes clear: Böhmermann would like to put his finger on the wound in this case as well. Or let’s say: He actively digs into the wound with his finger. In this case, the wound is the conditions under which German shipping is currently being operated. The TV presenter explains it all like this: Shipping has been on the upswing for years because shipping companies in Germany enjoy preferential tax treatment.
How Hapag-Lloyd rakes in billions
Shipowners pay neither income tax nor do they have to pay tax on their profits. The only tax that applies is the so-called tonnage tax. It is calculated based on the loading volume, not the value. “So it doesn’t matter to the tax office in Germany whether a ship is full to the brim with diamonds or whether there’s just a little talking shitty bear with a hat in the container,” Böhmermann puts it in a nutshell. By the way, by the bear he means Paddington.
Using the example of Germany’s largest shipping company, Hapag-Lloyd, he shows how absurd the whole thing is: they made a profit of 17.5 billion euros last year and had to pay tax on 1.15 percent of that. If it were a shipping company on land, at least 15 percent tax would have been incurred. Pretty unfair actually, as confirmed by Hapag-Lloyd owner Klaus Michael Kühne in an NDR interview. However, he does not change anything in the regulation.
Financial preferential treatment for shipping companies is always worth a stir – but unfortunately only the tip of the iceberg of the shoals in German shipping. Because the reason for the low taxes is officially to make Germany more attractive as a location for the ships. Sounds logical at first, in theory. In practice, however, only 270 of the 1,686 German merchant ships sail under the German flag. Confusing right? At first glance, definitely.
Hardly any ships flying the German flag
But only until you understand the mechanism behind it. Böhmermann sums it up like this: “German shipping companies already have many advantages, but still want more.” And because the owners of the shipping companies can’t quite get enough, to put it bluntly, they employ a tactic called flagging out. Roughly speaking, a letterbox company is founded abroad in order to be able to accept the country’s flag. The goal: to adopt the rules of the flag state and thus circumvent the German (comparatively strict) laws.
“It’s funny that only 16 percent of all German merchant ships are subject to German occupational safety,” says Böhmermann. But the reality is anything but funny: The seafarers are dramatically underpaid, there are sometimes poor hygiene standards and inhumane working hours. There is hardly any talk of social benefits or German occupational safety on board the ships. This in turn saves shipowners even more money. Is that reprehensible now? Allegedly. But not illegal in most cases, due to corresponding legal loopholes.
“What can shipowners do that they are allowed to do?” asks Böhmermann – with an admittedly ironic undertone. And yet the question is valid. Because the systematic exploitation on German ships is made possible by laws made by politicians. Incidentally, such a law is also the reason that Böhmermann was able to buy his lifebelt on the “MS Albatross” in India. There the ship landed on the world’s largest ship graveyard – to be cannibalized next to several other ships, some of which are mercury-contaminated and pollute the environment themselves. Böhmermann’s conclusion: “Well, seafaring doesn’t always have a happy ending.”
Source: ZDF Magazine Royale