It was an unannounced visit that showed up at Andrea Tandler’s offices on Tuesday. And, unlike the usual practice before Christmas, he didn’t bring any presents. Instead, investigators presented the Munich PR entrepreneur with a search warrant. The Munich I public prosecutor’s office is investigating the suspicion that the daughter of the CSU grandee Gerold Tandler may have incorrectly processed her million-dollar commissions from business with corona protective masks. Specifically, it is, among other things, about the question of where and how much trade tax the entrepreneur has paid.
Andrea Tandler got rich, really rich, after the Swiss company Emix sold masks to the health ministries in Bavaria and North Rhine-Westphalia and above all to the federal health ministry. According to SZ information, the Tandler subsidiary, together with a partner, was entitled to commission of 34 to 51 million euros through the joint company Little Penguin (Little Penguin). A large part of the money has apparently also flowed.
Little Penguin is based in Grünwald, a suburb of Munich. Known for its villas – and its low business tax rates. When Andrea Tandler started to broker the mask deals, it was evidenced by e-mails that went through her PR agency Pfennigturm, which is based in Munich. The city of Munich demands far higher trade tax rates from companies located there than the community of Grünwald.
The investigations became public through a request from the Landtag member Florian Siekmann of the Greens. Siekmann had asked the state government whether Tandler’s intermediary activity had produced “evidence of trade tax fraud”. And whether an initial suspicion of trade tax fraud is being investigated by Andrea Tandler in the context of police or public prosecution investigations.
The Ministry of Justice replied: “According to the Munich I Public Prosecutor’s Office, the matter raised is the subject of criminal investigations there. The investigations are ongoing.” The Ministry of Justice did not give details because of tax secrecy. In his inquiry Siekmann referred to the different offices of the Pfennigturm agency in Munich and the Little Penguin company in Grünwald.
Andrea Tandler never spoke
According to calculations by the SPD parliamentary group, Andrea Tandler and her partner are likely to have saved around four million euros in trade tax on alleged commission income from the mask deals amounting to almost 50 million euros through the company’s headquarters in Grünwald, compared to Munich. The SZ asked Andrea Tandler and her lawyer several times for comments on Tuesday. About the investigation, the search, and the SPD’s calculations.
Andrea Tandler preferred to remain silent. As before. She had not responded to previous SZ inquiries about other matters. It remains to be seen whether the suspicion confirmed by the Justice Department is confirmed or not. A preliminary investigation does not automatically lead to indictment or trial or conviction. If the allegations collapse, such proceedings will be discontinued.
The investigations against Andrea Tandler are unusual in that several thousand companies have an official company headquarters in Grünwald in order to benefit from the low trade tax rates there. Numerous other companies can be found in the two-story office building not far from the market square where Tandler’s Little Penguin GmbH is based. When an SZ reporter checked there a good six months ago, there was a bell with 61 names and a mailbox that Little Penguin GmbH shared with five other companies.
Other Grünwald tax saving companies have apparently been spared investigations so far, but the Tandler case is also exceptional. In spring 2020 after the start of the corona pandemic, the Swiss company Emix sold masks and other protective clothing in Germany for almost 700 million euros, mainly to the Federal Ministry of Health, through the mediation of the Tandler subsidiary. The current tax investigations have nothing to do with Emix.
Andrea Tandler made contact with the Bavarian Ministry of Health and the Federal Ministry of Health through the CSU MEP Monika Hohlmeier, the daughter of Franz Josef Strauss. The current investigations have nothing to do with Hohlmeier. The CSU politician said she didn’t ask for the contact brokerage and didn’t get anything. There is also no evidence whatsoever that Hohlmeier would have benefited in any other way. The CSU politician has repeatedly stated that at the time, like many other MPs, she passed on information about possible mask offers in order to be of assistance in getting protective clothing.
Florian Siekmann speaks of “greed for profit”
After Monika Hohlmeier had established contact with the Bavarian Ministry of Health for Andrea Tandler, the Tandler subsidiary contacted the Ministry “using contact details” from her Munich-based company Pfennigturm. This emerges from a response from the Ministry of Health to a state parliament request from the Greens. The millions in commission for Andrea Tandler and her partner then went through Little Penguin, a company based in Grünwald, which was later entered in the commercial register.
The Green MP Siekmann suspects Tandler of trying to get “as much as possible” out of the mask deals while avoiding the higher Munich trade tax rate. “The greed for profit that was dealt with here in the pandemic emergency leaves me stunned.” Siekmann says that everything is far from clear. The Greens now wanted to fully illuminate everything in the investigative committee set up in the state parliament to clear up the mask affairs. At Andrea Tandler you will “look very carefully”.
The presumption of innocence applies to the Tandler daughter as well as to other suspects in preliminary proceedings.