The former Prime Minister of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania wants to remain on the board of the controversial Climate Protection Foundation Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania. Their resolution is actually a done deal, and Manuela Schwesig also distanced herself.
Against the express will of the state parliament and state government, former Prime Minister Erwin Sellering wants to continue the controversial climate protection foundation Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania. The dissolution is not possible under foundation law and for reasons of liability. The legal situation is clear for the SPD politician: “For us as a foundation, a dissolution is off the table,” emphasized Sellering on Friday in Schwerin, referring to a report that the foundation’s board of directors had commissioned from the Bochum legal scholar Katharina Uffmann.
The state foundation, founded in early 2021 and managed by Sellering since then, has come under heavy criticism. In addition to the area of climate protection oriented towards the common good, it also included an economic area that helped the Russian state-owned company Gazprom to complete the construction of the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline through the Baltic Sea, bypassing US sanctions. The line was completed in autumn 2021. The business is in liquidation, Sellering said. However, it is important to continue the work on climate protection. This is the “most important task of the century,” said Sellering.
Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania: Sellering criticizes allegations against successor Schwesig
Documents that have become public show that representatives of the Gazprom subsidiary Nord Stream had a direct influence on the drafting of the foundation’s statutes. Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania’s Prime Minister Manuela Schwesig had admitted that there were talks, but rejected reports that Nord Stream 2 AG had been in charge of founding the foundation. The foundation’s biggest donor was Nord Stream 2 with 20 million euros. It is unclear how much of this will remain after a possible tax levy. According to Sellering, an examination is being carried out to determine whether the foundation is exempt from gift tax. The country itself gave 200,000 euros to the foundation.
After the start of the Russian war of aggression in Ukraine, the German government stopped the commissioning of the Russian-German gas pipeline. Schwesig also distanced herself from the project she had always supported before. She is also personally criticized for her pro-Russia course for a long time. The CDU foreign politician Norbert Röttgen had suggested that Schwesig resign because of her connections with Russia, but the Prime Minister rejected this.
The incumbent prime minister, who has come under pressure, sees no reason to resign. “Six months ago there was a state election in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, and the citizens confirmed me in my office with a large majority, with a strong vote of the citizens,” she said, according to a government spokesman on Thursday at a meeting of the northern German state governments in keel.
Sellering described the allegations against Schwesig as irrelevant, unjustified and sometimes disgusting. Sellering was Prime Minister of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania from 2008 to 2017. He resigned because of cancer, Manuela Schwesig succeeded him in office.
Source: Stern
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