“A Derailment”
Kubicki apologizes to Habeck
3/22/2023, 3:08 p.m
Kremlin boss Putin could also agree with Habeck’s concept of freedom. FDP Vice Kubicki condescends to this derailment in an interview. A day later he rowed back.
FDP Vice Wolfgang Kubicki apologized to Vice Chancellor Robert Habeck after a comparison with Putin. “I would like to formally apologize to Robert Habeck,” Kubicki said in a statement. “To put him in line with a wanted war criminal is complete nonsense and a derailment. That doesn’t work at all.” Robert Habeck is “an upright democrat, and I’d rather argue with him on the matter than about defamation,” added the FDP politician.
With regard to Habeck, Kubicki said to the subscription channel “Massentaste-TV”: “He thinks freedom is the insight into necessity. That means: Whoever submits himself voluntarily is really free. And whoever opposes that he whoever has to make their own decisions is in truth not free. After all, they are forced to oppose. That is a concept of freedom that Vladimir Putin could easily translate to his own ruling milieu.”
Kubicki also received a lack of understanding from the government. “I think that’s absolutely inappropriate,” said government spokesman Steffen Hebestreit. Kubicki has since apologized, “but I still don’t understand how you come to such a statement.”
The statements by Kubicki, who is also Vice President of the Bundestag, caused great outrage. Bundestag Vice-President Katrin Göring-Eckardt accused Kubicki in the “Tagesspiegel” of damaging the office of Bundestag Vice-President and also damaging his own party: “The FDP as a whole must be careful not to continue to be sidelined,” she said. “Wolfgang Kubicki once again violates the dignity of the office, and in terms of content, the FDP is mutating into a naysayer party. I find that very regrettable and worrying.”