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Economics Minister Robert Habeck (Greens) at a protest rally in Schwedt on Wednesday
Photo: Patrick Pleul / dpa
Green Robert Habeck is regularly the most popular politician in the polls, and journalists sound downright in love.
There is even a parody of an advertisement circulating: »Every ten minutes a journalist falls in love with Robert Habeck.«
It's different in East Germany.
In East Germany - especially in the provinces - the Greens are mistrusted.
One only has to open the letter-to-the-editor page of any East German regional newspaper these days to read how great the anger and hatred for the party is.
The party is seen as warmongering and blamed for the effects of the war in Ukraine, such as inflation, rising prices and energy shortages.
The anger is not directed against the distant aggressor Russia, but against the Greens, who want to block the continued operation of nuclear power plants and forbid people to take warm showers and drive cars.
The thesis that the effects of the sanctions will hit Germany harder than Russia is also often heard in the eastern federal states.
The bogeyman is always the Economics Minister Robert Habeck.
While his public contrition is considered brilliant communication in the West, many East Germans see his demeanor as insubstantial and just a show.
The latest example: Habeck's appearance in Schwedt last Wednesday, which again dealt with the future of the refinery, PCK Schwedt.
As a reminder, the 1,200 employees fear for their jobs because Schwedt is completely dependent on Russian supplies of raw materials. If no more oil is to flow through the pipeline at the end of the year because of the embargo, the plant is on the brink of collapse.
It is also unclear how the supply of Berlin and large parts of East Germany with petrol and diesel will then work.
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Saxony-Anhalt as a role model: refinery in Schwedt is looking for an alternative to Russian oil
Habeck was greeted with a wall of unfriendliness and rejection.
A demonstrator held up a placard that read "Greens to the Eastern Front."
Which Eastern Front?
One could benevolently interpret it as a call for the Greens to become more involved in the East.
But maybe it was meant differently.
In the audience, Uckermärker, whose trust in politics has long been disturbed and who have difficulty understanding the meaning and purpose of the oil embargo, mixed with AfD supporters and conspiracy theorists.
Why should they suffer for what they see as a regional conflict?
A Russian flag also fluttered in the wind.
Now Habeck is used to attacks in the East, he experienced them again and again during his election campaign last year.
But what happened in the northeast on Wednesday evening had a different quality.
And it's much more than a small, regional dispute, but an East-West conflict, an SPD-Green conflict that has spilled over into federal politics.
It is not just about the continued existence of an important industrial company with 1,200 jobs, but also about how the transformation that is imminent for the entire country, away from fossil fuels and towards sustainable energy sources, can succeed.
And things aren't looking good right now.
If one of the organizers, the Schwedt ophthalmologist Konstanze Fischer, type tough Ostfrau, hadn't called the audience to order from the stage in a friendly and authoritarian manner, Habeck would not have had a chance to speak.
And even as he spoke, his speech was interrupted by whistles and shouts of "warmonger."
The minister seemed visibly offended, struggled for composure and brought the speech to an end with difficulty.
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Endangered refinery in Schwedt: Nothing new for the East A column by Sabine Rennefanz
However, it may not have contributed to building trust that Habeck ultimately had little new to offer, which would have gone beyond what he had already said four weeks ago in an appearance in front of the workforce.
How hard the federal government is working on replacement supply chains, for example through ship deliveries that come from Rostock via a pipeline.
However, in much smaller quantities than through the Druzhba pipeline.
The large-scale planned expropriation of the owner Rosnjeft is apparently more difficult than expected.
Habeck again promised state aid and support for the 1,200 employees - and sealed the promise with a handshake.
But the distrust remains.
What is the employment guarantee?
Does it really apply to all jobs, will wages and salaries be retained?
It is,
Mayor Annegret Hoppe said the beautiful, typically East German sentence: "You know how it is, you need written documents." The most important lesson in the legal republic after thirty years of unity.
The PCK works council and the IGBCE union are also jointly demanding written commitments for "investments in the future of the refinery and the safeguarding of all jobs and training positions," said a union representative.
The task force, headed by Habeck's State Secretary Michael Kellner, will meet again next Monday.
The Thuringian waiter lives as a newcomer with his family in the Uckermark, but has hardly any standing in the region - which is also not helpful for a solution.
Interestingly, the criticism hardly hits the SPD - although Chancellor Scholz is the one who announced the oil embargo.
And although it would also be the task of the Federal Chancellor to keep explaining to the citizens why Germany has long since indirectly become a war party through sanctions and arms deliveries, and why it is in our strategic interest that Germany no longer takes oil from Russia, Hungary but still.
There are quite a few, well, gaps in the public discourse that are not filled by images of the G7 workation (work, work plus vacation, holidays).
As with the refugee issue or compulsory vaccinations, the East deviates from the West German mainstream, if one may say so in general terms.
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The fact that the frustration with the Greens is so great also has to do with the fact that many Social Democrats also deliberately exploit the mistrust of the Greens.
The SPD Prime Minister Dietmar Woidke and the state SPD have been more or less openly scolding the Greens for weeks and are apparently trying to draw political capital from the fight for Schwedt.
However, a prominent member of the Brandenburg state association has made himself rare: Olaf Scholz, who was directly elected in Potsdam.
The more time passes and the greater the anger, the more one asks oneself: why was the Federal Chancellor actually not yet in Schwedt?
If his economics minister is attacked, it will sooner or later affect the entire federal government.