The federal-state group decides to stay the course in the Corona policy. That may be necessary, but Olaf Scholz’s self-portrayal is increasingly irritating. The Chancellor only sees successes, denies problems and thus gambles away credibility.
At first glance, the prime ministers’ conference on how to deal with the corona pandemic, which ended on Monday evening, falls into the category of ‘few surprises’. The motto of the event, proclaimed by Federal Chancellor Olaf Scholz and confirmed by his party colleague, Berlin’s Mayor Franziska Giffey, is “stay on course”. That sounds good, sounds like “everything under control”. But the rhetoric is deceptive: in the coming weeks, millions of people will become infected with the coronavirus pathogen. A slowed down partial contamination happens, even if Federal Minister of Health Karl Lauterbach has always warned against contamination. But because important preparations have been omitted, Germany lays down its arms in front of the Omicron variant. But Scholz doesn’t say that. Instead, he talks the situation up, just as he puts the course of the federal-state meeting in an exaggeratedly positive light.
Since Scholz has been chancellor, he and the SPD have never tired of praising the supposedly new unity and efficiency of the prime ministerial conferences. Scholz is silent about the fact that the CDU/CSU-governed states are mostly dissatisfied, that Baden-Württemberg, which is governed by a Green Party, and Thuringia, which is governed by a Left Party, regularly criticize the MPK resolutions in the protocol declarations attached to the resolutions. This Monday, too, he spoke of a “very good” conference and, when asked, emphasized that the exchange with the prime ministers was “solidarity” and “forward-looking”.
What quarrel?
In truth, several country heads in Lauterbach read the riot act for the surprising and unannounced shortening of the recovery period by the Robert Koch Institute last Friday. Hesse’s Prime Minister Volker Bouffier accused Lauterbach in the video link of not having experienced such communication in 30 years. Saxony’s Prime Minister Michael Kretschmer then spoke of “Holterdipolter” communication and “critical comments across party lines”.
But at the press conference that followed, Scholz acted clueless and praised his “great minister”, who had not even had the opportunity to demonstrate anything like greatness in such a short term. Scholz’ whitewashing of the scandal is doubly problematic. First of all, the Chancellor does not seem to be giving honest information about the course of the Prime Ministers’ Conference. Secondly, he downplays a problem that many citizens believe is a big one: there is a lack of reliability in corona politics. What has not been promised to people if they only get vaccinated. Every further disappointment, every further surprising rule change costs the politicians trust. Transparency and self-criticism could counteract this, but Scholz would rather govern silently and closed to the outside world.
Surprised by the lack of PCR
But what is even worse: Germany is losing control and overview of the pandemic, as avoidable as it is foreseeable. Although already in December daily new infections in the six-digit range, the federal and state governments seem to have been surprised by the overload of PCR test capacities. No attempt has been made to expand these capacities, either in the past few months or in the short term.
Lauterbach’s reference to “RTL aktuell” that the 400,000 PCR tests that the city of Vienna alone can handle are only a kind of light version of the German laboratory test is again such a nice talk. Nevertheless, Austria keeps an overview and the citizens of the country have a proper basis for their own isolation and early treatment of possible symptoms. In Germany, people will in future be able to test themselves in and out of quarantine with unanswered questions for employees and employers. The test regulation agreed on Monday, which has not yet been scheduled, is apparently still in its infancy.
“Prioritize” means limit
Meanwhile, the federal government claims that the rapid tests provide sufficient security, although patients with symptoms also report numerous false-negative test results. In addition, this evasive strategy is based on the fact that, contrary to all empirical values, all people will behave prudently and will thoroughly test themselves; drive to test centers that cannot be reached as quickly as in Berlin-Mitte or get tests yourself on the Internet, because the quick test supply in retail is not reliable. But Scholz and Lauterbach say they don’t know anything about that either.
The PCR tests are only “prioritized” – another rhetorical whitewash. What is meant, however, is that access is restricted and the statistical recording of the infected is practically abandoned. How many people are infected will be extrapolated based on the number of sick leave and hospital occupancy. Anyone who has to react to such numbers reacts late.
Nothing but successes
When it comes to the tiresome vaccination question, Scholz only accepts successes and is silent about problems. Scholz had targeted 30 million booster vaccinations for December and January. That worked well in December, when those who wanted to be vaccinated finally received a wide range of boosters. In January, Scholz only conceded when asked: “We will no longer achieve that on the day I would like it to be.” That’s why he much prefers to talk about the fact that Germany has set up the most successful booster campaign. Even more successful countries can be found in a European comparison.
There are numerous examples of Scholz’s rhetoric and easy for the public to see through. That seems at least inappropriate given the seriousness of the situation and the growing number of missed opportunities to manage the pandemic more wisely. The Chancellor, who always thinks pragmatically, may consider the expedient optimism he has spread to be necessary. But those who constantly deny conflicts and downplay problems lose credibility and trust – the most important asset of an elected politician.