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Scholz has lost momentum: In the case of the mandatory vaccination debate, the traffic light government can only hope for a random majority

2022-01-26T09:40:01.041Z


Scholz has lost momentum: In the case of the mandatory vaccination debate, the traffic light government can only hope for a random majority Created: 01/26/2022, 10:31 am By: Georg Anastasiadis Georg Anastasiadis, editor-in-chief of the Münchner Merkur, commented on the Bundestag debate on Wednesday, January 26th, about compulsory vaccination and the lack of clear announcements by Chancellor Ola


Scholz has lost momentum: In the case of the mandatory vaccination debate, the traffic light government can only hope for a random majority

Created: 01/26/2022, 10:31 am

By: Georg Anastasiadis

Georg Anastasiadis, editor-in-chief of the Münchner Merkur, commented on the Bundestag debate on Wednesday, January 26th, about compulsory vaccination and the lack of clear announcements by Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD).

© Hannibal Hanschke/AP/dpa/Marcus sleep

The government cannot rely on its own majority for the mandatory vaccination debate in the Bundestag.

Chancellor Scholz has not only failed to show leadership on this current conflict issue.

A commentary by Georg Anastasiadis.

Whoever orders leadership from him will get it, Olaf Scholz said during the election campaign.

There have been opportunities to redeem his full-bodied promise.

But after seven weeks of traffic light government, the Germans are still waiting for clear statements from the new chancellor.

War is threatening in Europe, but Germany, head of government first, is stumbling through the Ukraine crisis, helpless and disoriented.

Energy prices are skyrocketing, but the government is acting like it's none of their business.

And now the chancellor has completely lost momentum with the compulsory vaccination that has been delayed for too long.

The traffic light fears a compulsory vaccination veto from Karlsruhe


Today, the Bundestag is discussing the competing compulsory vaccination models for the first time.

The very fact that the traffic light government does not dare to make its own proposal, but is waiting to see which majority will be thrown together in the Bundestag, reveals its embarrassment.

Due to the critical position of large parts of the FDP on compulsory vaccination, she neither has her own design majority, nor does she have the certainty that the constitutional court will not collect her law.

Public support for compulsory vaccination, which was still overwhelming at the height of the delta wave, is shrinking with each passing day that, thanks to Omikron, the end of the pandemic is getting closer.

Of course, the obligation to vaccinate helps to contain it,

it at least protects against severe disease progression and thus relieves the clinics - but does it also fulfill the constitutional principle of proportionality, especially against the background of only moderately effective vaccines and increasingly violent social conflicts?

Practitioners also warn that at most five percent of the population could be persuaded to get vaccinated by making it mandatory.

Is it worth the effort?

Objections piled high before compulsory vaccination

The government has allowed the issue to drift for too long and now has to be taught by constitutional lawyers that, depending on how it is structured, the objections to the compulsory vaccination are piling up towering. In any case, the only models that seem appropriate to the muddled situation are graduated and strictly limited in time, such as compulsory vaccination only for those over 50 years of age who are particularly hard hit by Corona. A possible way out for the traffic light coalition would be to have the Bundestag decide on compulsory vaccination in principle, but only activate it in the "case of the case", for example if an aggressive mutation spreads, about which the Minister of Health Lauterbach is already warning. However, the chosen procedure of letting the Bundestag decide in a dynamic group procedure is likely to stand in the way of such compromises.Quite apart from the fact that it would be a politically sensitive maneuver if the Bundestag granted the government power of attorney by means of a preliminary resolution to decide on such a central intervention in fundamental rights as the enactment of compulsory vaccination according to its own taste.

In any case, the Union faction will not get involved.

Why should she pull the potatoes out of the fire for a traffic light coalition without a majority?

This means that the obligation to vaccinate is hanging by a thread.

Even if it comes at the end, it will probably not achieve its goals of ending the pandemic and bringing peace to the country.

Source: merkur

All news articles on 2022-01-26

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