Giffey's resignation: departure summa cum laude

Franziska Giffey couldn't have done anything better.

The Chancellor - she is a member of the CDU - says goodbye to the SPD politician summa cum laude in the Berlin election campaign, from which Giffey would like to emerge as governing mayor in the autumn.

The tones that Merkel struck after Giffey's resignation as Federal Minister were so full of praise that it can almost be read as incomprehension or even annoyance about the reasons for this resignation.

However, when Theodor zu Guttenberg resigned because of allegations of plagiarism and when Annette Schavan withdrew in a similar case, Merkel had already indicated that she was relying on other qualities at the cabinet table than those of "scientific assistants".

Giffey draws conclusions from a case that has not yet been fully closed.

The second examination procedure, which deals with allegations of plagiarism, will presumably not go away with a complaint.

As soon as the Free University decided to repair the first procedure, Giffey decided to flee to the front and announced her resignation as minister in the event that her violations should be proven in her doctoral thesis.

knowledge and conscience

She assured, as now again, that she had written her work to the best of her knowledge and belief.

Should she lose her title, that would mean that she was very poorly looked after at the time or that she was working in an environment in which knowledge and conscience generally believe that they are on the right side.

Giffey now decided in terms of her career planning.

Success in Berlin would mean that she would not remain a minister anyway.

In Berlin, there is no threat of resistance, either in the party or in a future coalition in which the SPD is involved.

The voters should also treat her graciously in a city that may in the future be governed by a coalition that has made fare dodging a government program. In this affair there remains the pale aftertaste that deception is disguised as a venial sin right into the Chancellery, just as if one had once traveled without a ticket.