Things have been turbulent at the Luxembourg court in the past few months. In focus: Grand Duchess Maria Teresa (63), who, to put it nicely, is said to have exceeded her powers. The result was numerous redundancies and a special representative named Jeannot Waringo. The financial expert was used by politicians to write a report in which the allegations against the Grand Duchess should be examined. In the end, there were 43 pages that could make massive changes to the court.
The critic
The background to this offensive is as follows: Around 30 palace employees are said to have quit or have been dismissed since 2015. That is just under a third of the staff, which is largely financed from tax funds. Grand Duchess Maria Theresa in particular was held responsible for this, as reported by "Today.rtl.lu". The special representative has now checked whether there is anything behind the allegations. From discussions with the staff to the inspection of various documents – Jeannot took a close look at the farm and came to a clear decision: it was time to make changes in the organization, in personnel management and in several other areas. The bottom line: the mood in the courtyard is bad.
There are signs that are not deceptive. I noticed, rightly or wrongly, that cheerfulness and humor were rare in conversations and discussions among colleagues. Everyone is on guard and weighs up his words.
Drama queen?
In fact, Maria Teresa contributed to the enormous staff turnover. Because: "Decisions in the area of personnel management, be it with regard to recruitment, assignment to the various departments or also with regard to the dismissal, were taken by your Royal Highness the Grand Duchess," says the Waringo report. Are we dealing with Frozen? The special representative sees the problem of possible waste of money in the organization itself. In the future, he will require more transparency in the allocation of funds.
In the next step, the report will now be submitted to the parliamentary committee. We can only assume that nothing will be the way it was afterwards. The Luxembourg court will have to be turned upside down for something to happen. The Court also appears to have recognized this: they are ready to make the improvements proposed by the report. It's about time
Sources used: Today.rtl.lu, Bunte.de