Enlarge image

Photo: Fabian Sommer / dpa

It has been an eventful two years since the SPD, FDP and Greens took over the reins of government together.

This was not only due to external factors - such as the Russian attack on Ukraine - but also to internal disputes at the traffic lights.

Federal Agriculture Minister Cem Özdemir (Greens) has now clearly criticized the government's external representation.

“We will manage to ensure that our acceptable balance sheet is not received because we argue like tinkers,” said Özdemir to the “Rheinische Post” on Monday evening in Düsseldorf at the Ständehaus meeting. 

The last two years, for example, have been the most successful for agriculture; the number of farm deaths has decreased.

Nevertheless, the farmers' protests now threatened to slip away even from the conservative farmers' associations.

When he took office as Federal Agriculture Minister, he “found a barrel full to the brim” and the government managed to overflow the barrel with savings decisions on agricultural diesel, for example.

Özdemir emphasized again that he was not involved.

The partial correction of the resolutions also came too late.

“The protests were already organized.”

View to North Rhine-Westphalia and Baden-Württemberg

“We can learn a lesson from the very successful black-green coalitions in North Rhine-Westphalia and Baden-Württemberg,” said the 58-year-old.

Criticism of one's own party was echoed in the heating law: people underestimated society's weariness with change.

“The traffic lights really made a lot of mistakes,” said Özdemir.

But the mountain of problems did not arise in the last two years and there are also merits: Despite the "idiotic dependence on Putin's gas," Germany got through the winter well.

He now wonders what the previous governments did when tax revenues bubbled up: "The infrastructure is in a disastrous state."

Özdemir appealed to the opposition to give up their blockade in the Federal Council.

The Growth Opportunities Act is important for the economy.

"It's not just the traffic light problems, it's national problems." It's time to put national interests ahead of party well-being.

jok/dpa