Only the Greens, FDP and the Left publish the amount of party donations – CDU, AfD and SPD in the Recklinghausen district give no answer despite being asked.
Party donations – a sensitive topic – not just since the Corona mask scandal with incidents of alleged advantages taken by several members of the Bundestag and Landtag of the Union or the involvement of politicians from the CDU and CSU in business with Azerbaijan, where there are allegations of lobbying and corruption. In addition, the federal elections are just around the corner, even if most of the party donations go to local politics – and thus not to the headquarters in Berlin or Munich.
Election campaigns cost a lot of money
The research network “Correctiv” asked all district associations in Germany how much money had been received as party donations in the past year, and inquiries were also made in the Recklinghausen district. Because not only the federal election campaign costs money, also in the local elections one hundred thousand euros have to be made available. The election campaigns are largely financed through donations. A prominent example is the Regensburg case with the mayoral election in 2014. “Correctiv” reports that Joachim Wolbergs (SPD) was convicted in June 2020 by the Regional Court of Regensburg for “taking bribes in connection with party donations”. Counterparty Christian Schlegl was found guilty of “aiding and abetting tax evasion” a short time later.
Greens reveal numbers 100 percent
There are no such cases in the Recklinghausen district. Nevertheless, it is worth taking a look at the party donations. Around 850 district associations have disclosed to “Correctiv” for the first time how many party donations flowed in the years 2016 to 2019. This means that 7.6 million euros can be allocated for 2019 alone. While the Greens disclosed 100 percent of all donations, it was 80 percent for the Left and a third for the SPD. The FDP, CDU / CSU and AfD were almost completely silent.
FDP and left provide information
In the Recklinghausen district, the FDP, the Greens and the Left are transparent – the CDU, SPD and AfD are not. In Germany, parties only have to publish their donations in the statement of accounts with the origin of the donation if the amount exceeds 10,000 euros.
In total, the Left received between 7,239 and 15,193 euros annually between 2016 and 2020. It was a total of 53,376 euros. In time (there is no information for 2020), the Greens are looking at donations between 10,797 and 22,290 euros, a total of 59,484 euros.
Members donate to the Free Democrats
“The Free Democrats in the Recklinghausen district stand for transparent communication when it comes to party funding,” explains FDP treasurer Stefan Weber. In 2019 the FDP district association Recklinghausen received donations in the amount of 6,600 euros, in the election year 2020 it was 8,100 euros. Incidentally, all donations came from members of the party.
In Dortmund they are more open
Despite several written inquiries from our editorial team, the AfD, CDU and SPD remained silent. There was also no answer to the question of why the donations were not made public. In any case, it cannot be due to data protection – the request did not touch on this topic, after all the editorial team was only concerned with the numbers, not the names.
However, the Recklinghausen district is in good company. In the neighboring cities of Gelsenkirchen, Bochum, Bottrop, Essen and Herne as well as in the neighboring districts of Coesfeld, Wesel, Borken and Unna, no party except for the Greens and the Left gave anything away. The city of Dortmund is an exception. The CDU also disclosed the figures there: 164,952 euros (2016 to 2019).
–
