Cum-Ex investigative committee: what to expect from the Scholz survey
Created: 08/18/2022, 10:12 am
By: Moritz Serif
Olaf Scholz will appear before the Hamburg investigative committee on Friday.
The parties have different expectations of the survey.
Hamburg – CDU and leftists in the Hamburg Parliament have great expectations of the second hearing of Chancellor Olaf Scholz before the committee of inquiry into the Cum-Ex scandal this Friday (August 19).
"I expect Mr. Scholz to finally unpack and clean the slate," said CDU chairman Richard Seelmaecker.
Nobody believes in the memory gaps that the chancellor refers to in connection with meetings with the shareholders of the Warburg Bank involved in the scandal when he was mayor of Hamburg.
The committee is to clarify possible influence of leading SPD politicians on the tax treatment of the bank.
It is about claims of many millions of euros, which the Hamburg tax authorities had initially statute-barred in 2016.
He expects Scholz to answer the questions truthfully and precisely "and not rumble or evade," said Seelmaecker.
Cum-Ex investigative committee: "Scholz's time of cheating is over"
"Unlike in other situations, he is obliged to tell the truth in the committee
of inquiry." "The time when Scholz & Co. cheated through is finally over," said Left Chairman Norbert Hackbusch.
"It is said that important information was withheld from the investigative committee." According to the committee, a corresponding suspicion emerges from the investigation files transmitted by the Cologne public prosecutor's office.
"Should this suspicion be confirmed, it would be another serious scandal," said Hackbusch.
SPD chairman Milan Pein pointed out that the allegations had not yet been confirmed in the committee.
“More than 50 witnesses from different offices, authorities and departments made it very clear, independently of one another, that there was no political influence on the Warburg Bank’s tax procedure.”
Federal Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) © Carsten Koall/dpa/archive image
Scholz comments on the Cum-Ex investigative committee
The chancellor himself has already dampened expectations of his statement.
Scholz said in his summer press conference that the committee had not found any evidence of influence since it was set up at the end of 2020.
"I am sure that this knowledge will not be changed," said Scholz.
The Union parliamentary group in the Bundestag wants to follow the Chancellor's statement "with great attention", according to parliamentary group leader Mathias Middelberg (CDU).
"Depending on the quality and credibility of the statement, we will decide whether Olaf Scholz should also be invited to the Finance Committee of the German Bundestag for questioning," Middelberg told the
Neue Osnabrücker Zeitung
.