The decision was almost unanimous: With the votes of 22 of the 23 members, the Broadcasting Council of Rundfunk Berlin Brandenburg recalled Patricia Schlesinger without notice.

The artistic director, who has already resigned, has completely lost the trust in the broadcaster, and she has shaken trust in public broadcasting.

A system in which antics like theirs are possible has a massive problem.

It does not matter which of the numerous allegations leveled against Schlesinger will prove to be criminally relevant.

It's the sum that counts, because this indicates a system failure.

This is good for a satirical series

Consulting contracts are awarded under questionable circumstances, a construction project turns out to be twice as expensive as planned, and the financing is said to be made with recourse to the employees' pension fund.

Strange rental transactions are concluded, bonuses are paid out, of which nobody is allowed to know why and how much.

There are contracts for the director's husband, not with the broadcaster, but with Messe Berlin, whose supervisory board chairman was also the head of the RBB board of directors.

Luxury equipment at the top is the order of the day, from the company car with a massage chair at a special price to the 1.4 million euro conversion of the executive floor, including pre-oiled parquet from Italy and an automatically watered plant wall.

In addition, there are crooked accounts of business meals in the Schlesinger house.

The details cannot be painted any more colorfully.

This is ideal for a satirical series, the screenwriters don't have to invent anything.

There is no trace of checks and balances in the RBB, on the contrary.

The head of the board of directors works together with the director, there are agreements in private without a record.

The Board of Directors is not doing its job and the Broadcasting Council is only now doing its job.

Almost exactly two years ago, the Broadcasting Council had elected Schlesinger for a second term with 26 out of 28 votes.

If the online medium "Business Insider" hadn't started examining the situation in the RBB, everything would have been the same there.

"Full Enlightenment"?

In the meantime, it is surprisingly quiet in the other public broadcasters.

The new ARD chairman, Tom Buhrow, calls for complete clarification and a strengthening of the supervisory bodies.

But that's about it.

That's easy to say, and it's easy to say, because the directors know what could happen if every stone were turned over in their own house.

Then it would become obvious that we are dealing with a system that automatically receives the money that the citizens are forced to raise, which last amounted to EUR 8.42 billion per year, and they do with it what they want.

That's what they're supposed to do, to make a program, so that the rather arrogant slogan about the "democracy tax" makes sense.

However, what is financed with this

Why do directors earn more than what is paid in the highest offices of state?

Why is the level of earnings in the institutions generally exceptional from the middle level onwards?

Is it right that broadcasters are investing hundreds of millions in concrete?

Does the program match the effort?

Do the broadcasters have to, should, be allowed to do everything on all playout channels?

Buy expensive football rights, employ entertainment moderators at top conditions?

These are questions that interest everyone and on which federal politicians from all parties are commenting these days.

But they have to edit the federal states, and only these.

It took the federal states six years to pass the first part of the new media state treaty, which sharpens the broadcasting mandate of the institutions a little and gives the supervisory bodies more say.

But that doesn't change the system, it wouldn't prevent a scandal like the one at RBB.

The supervisory bodies are toothless, the administrative boards in key positions are filled with political professionals or officials who keep the system running as it is.

The Fees Commission KEF repeatedly gives sharp indications of grievances.

But since the Federal Constitutional Court equates freedom of the press with the right of public broadcasters not to allow anyone to control them, nothing changes.

If someone breaks out of the cartel, like Reiner Haseloff (CDU), Prime Minister of Saxony-Anhalt, when the contribution was last increased, he is considered an enemy of democracy.

This would only come to an end if the state governments finally found the courage to decree transparency, accountability and citizen proximity and to set limits for the public service broadcasting system.

Unfortunately, this is not to be expected.