Former Chancellor Gerhard Schröder may remain in the SPD. The arbitration commission of the SPD sub-district Region Hannover rejected all requests for a party expulsion, as the party announced on Monday. He said he was “not guilty of violating party rules”. 17 regional party associations had initiated regulatory proceedings against Schröder. He has been criticized for his closeness to President Vladimir Putin and the Russian oil and gas industry. After the invasion of Ukraine in February, according to many SPD comrades, he did not sufficiently distance himself from Russia. The decision of the Arbitration Commission can still be appealed.
The commission argues that Schröder’s personal friendship with Putin does not violate the statutes of the SPD. This is a private matter – and it is also not apparent that Schröder is driving the president to war. “It would certainly be desirable and appropriate for a Social Democrat” to distance themselves more clearly from the war and not just consider it a mistake, as Schroeder does, the reasoning goes on. But he is “with his statements not so far outside the program and principles of the SPD that the party no longer has to endure them”. Schröder neither called for a war of aggression nor justified the attack on Ukraine.
And finally, the former chancellor’s commitment to Russian corporations and their gas and oil exports to Germany is not damaging to the party. If the possibility of “exercising economic and political pressure on Germany in this way would be a violation of the principles of solidarity, this would have to apply to the Social Democratic members of the Federal Government in the same way”. After all, they would ultimately have to be responsible for gas imports from Russia.
Even as chancellor, Schröder had sought closeness to Russia – including personally to its president and temporary Prime Minister Putin. After his tenure, he worked for various Russian energy companies. He chairs the supervisory bodies of the pipeline operating companies Nord Stream AG and Nord Stream 2 AG. In May 2022, he announced that he no longer wanted to remain chairman of the board of directors of the oil company Rosneft and would not accept an offer to him on the board of directors of Gazprom.
Only two weeks ago, Schröder met Putin in Moscow
These commitments repeatedly met with criticism in Germany, including in the SPD. It became much louder when, shortly before the Russian attack on Ukraine, the former chancellor accused the government of “saber rattling” and, in the opinion of many, did not sufficiently distance himself from Putin’s war of aggression. The party leadership suggested that he leave the SPD, and at the same time various sub-divisions applied for regulatory proceedings against Schröder. He was last in Moscow two weeks ago, where he also met Putin. He then said in an interview: “The good news is that the Kremlin wants a negotiated solution.” Perhaps a ceasefire could be negotiated. The war against Ukraine was a mistake by the government in Moscow, said Schröder. But there are “real fears of encirclement in Russia that are fed by history. And unfortunately they are justified.”
The three-person arbitration commission in Hanover negotiated the 17 applications in mid-July. Non-party members were not allowed to do so. Schröder himself did not appear at the appointment and did not send a lawyer. At the end of a regulatory procedure, there can be different steps: from a reprimand to the suspension of membership rights for a certain period of time to the exclusion of a party. The latter, however, only “if the member has intentionally violated the statutes or significantly violated the principles or the rules of the party and this has caused serious damage to the party”, as stated in the SPD organizational statute called. According to the SPD Hanover, all 17 applicants had pleaded for this step before the arbitration commission.
You can now appeal against your decision within two weeks – then the next higher instance, the arbitration commission of the SPD district in Hanover, has to decide. The case may even go as far as the Federal Arbitration Commission.