Billionaire Clemens Tönnies resigned from the position of head of the supervisory board of the German Schalke 04 after almost two decades. The 64-year-old businessman in the meat industry has recently been criticized for non-football matters as well, and the club is not in an ideal sports or financial situation.
About 1,000 Schalke fans demonstrated against Tönnies on Saturday during the final duel of the Bundesliga season. The departure of one of the 100 richest Germans from the club was also demanded because his meat processing plant in the town of Rheda-Wiedenbrück became one of the outbreaks of the covid-19 disease. A year ago, Tönnies again raised up racist remarks against Africans, for which he left office for a while.
Tönnies has been a member of Schalke since 1994 and moved to its lead seven years later. During his time at the club, the Gelsenkirchen team won the German Cup three times, was vice-champion five times and presented themselves in the Champions League ten times.
In recent years, however, the sporting and economic situation of the club has deteriorated. In the 2018/19 year, Schalke almost relegated and finished twelfth in a series of 16 matches without a win in the recently concluded season. In addition, even before the coronavirus crisis, Schalke’s debts climbed to almost 200 million euros (5.3 billion crowns).
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