ALLIANCE FO§ DEMOCRACY

Regrettable Incident

It is not clear why President Gauck has such a problem with the "Left." As a former pastor he somehow fell into the ranks of those who after the reunification railed against all that injustice in the GDR. And he has this problem with the Left Party despite having recently attended the ceremony in Leipzig to commemorate the Monday demonstrations on 9 October 1989, 25 years after the reunification. Before that, during the Communist era, he had barely got his hands dirty. He can hardly claim to have made a career as an opponent of the state.
After reunification, Gauck somehow served 11 years as Special Representative for the Stasi Records (1990-2000), and then the former pastor was good enough to become President of Germany, after Christian Wulff was forced from office. Gauck took office on 18 March 2012; his first two-and-a-half years were marked by a series of stumbles. Above all, there was the signing of the ESM/Fiscal Compact, which Wulff refused to do, leading to his ouster. The latest misstep concerns the "discomfort" felt by the German president over the Red-Red-Green coalition government of the State of Thuringia.
Perhaps a distinction should be made between citizen Gauck, and the personal prejudices he may have, and German President Gauck, who must remain neutral, while reading the riot act to the politicians. In the case of Gauck and, let’s say, his embellished biography as an East German rebel, it is all the more offensive that, instead of embracing new and broader points of view, especially considering that Thuringia’s leftist leader Bodo Ramelow is a Wessi (West German) and Catholic, he proclaims an electoral mandate amid curses and warnings and says nothing about the Red-Red coalition government in Brandenburg, also formed in early November. This makes us ask,why? Is Gauck unhappy about the Wessi Ramelow leading the Thuringia government because he does not listen to Gauck’s biased opinions about other political ideas? Gauck has no party, but he does have an opinion.
Gauck's worry lines show how much this country's democracy is at risk. They also show that a former pastor often feels threatened by something that has never been a threat to him. The array of political parties includes leftists. They have done their work and voters have entrusted them with responsibility. They have to fulfil this responsibility. At the end of their terms of office, they will be evaluated and new elections will be held. This also affects Mr. Gauck. He was also elected, and will be evaluated based on what he has done for the nation. Then he can retire and will be paid by the taxpayer until the end of his life, regardless of whether he has done anything useful or simply been subservient to partisan interests.
With this in mind, it may not even matter what Gauck says or does. However, when he violates his mandate and publically expresses opinions that he should keep to himself as the German president, this shows how easily partisan wrangling can distract from the really difficult problems, such as preventing the state from going bankrupt. The news media plays their part in the game and, as we said, Gauck does not seem to care what he says to them. Left Party Chairwoman Kipping’s outrage is believable, but pointless. Why should the left concern itself about the opinions of someone who has no idea. What this really shows is that the powers that brought the GDR down and established the new post-reunification order, with its undemocratic principles, are still at work. They promote the undemocratic system that reigned during the GDR era and was supposed to have been vanquished. Therefore, there has been no reappraisal of the GDR era, and democracy has not prevailed in Germany. All of this may be a bit discomforting to a German president, particularly a former pastor, which almost sounds like an accusation in Gauck’s case, and such a career would probably cause someone to break out in a sweat. But the president remains silent in this regard. What a pity!