“What a life’s achievement. What a political life,” said CDU chairman Friedrich Merz on Friday in front of several hundred guests in the Protestant town church in Schäuble’s hometown of Offenburg. Schäuble died on St. Stephen’s Day at the age of 81 following a long, serious illness.
Schäuble from Baden held important political offices: he was a minister, CDU leader, parliamentary group leader and president of the German Bundestag. Nobody has been a member of Parliament longer than him.
The Prime Minister of Baden-Württemberg, Winfried Kretschmann (Greens), paid tribute to the deceased as a shaper of Europe, a passionate democrat and a great son of the country. “With Wolfgang Schäuble, our country is losing a great political personality,” said Kretschmann. “He thought things through and thought them from the end.” Schäuble might also be tough, but at the same time made compromises that he viewed as an important virtue of democracy and not as a weakness, said Kretschmann.
Schäuble’s daughter Christine Strobl gave personal insights into the well-known politician’s life. Her father had many health problems that were never made public. He mastered everything with incredible effort. “Dad, you were a total work of art,” said the ARD program director. She recalled her father’s strong will to persevere and the assassination attempt in 1990, which left Schäuble dependent on a wheelchair.
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Merz said that Schäuble had “imprinted generations of members of our group, including me personally. Without him, I wouldn’t be here today.” The CDU leader continued: “We have become increasingly close friends over the last three decades.” His former party colleague has served in 16 of the country’s 24 governments to date, and he was a member of almost one in three of them. “He was denied two high state positions. He would have undoubtedly filled both of them.”
Among the mourners were the German Interior Minister Nancy Faeser (SPD), the President of the German Federal Constitutional Court, Stephan Harbarth, Kretschmann’s predecessors Günther Oettinger and Erwin Teufel (both CDU), State Interior Minister Thomas Strobl (CDU) and the former Luxembourg Prime Minister Jean-Claude Juncker.
Hundreds of people gathered in front of the church in downtown Offenburg. Soldiers from the Bundeswehr Guard Battalion lined up in an honor formation following the service. The Koblenz Army Music Corps played several pieces of music, including the German national anthem and the funeral march from the oratorio “Saul” by George Frideric Handel. The funeral procession with the coffin then moved towards the local Waldbach cemetery, where Schäuble was buried.
Political Berlin will say goodbye to Schäuble on January 22nd. On this day, the Bundestag will host the state mourning ceremony ordered by German Federal President Frank-Walter Steinmeier in the plenary hall of the Reichstag building. The leaders of the German state – especially Steinmeier – and hundreds of guests from home and abroad are expected. French President Emmanuel Macron also wants to attend the state mourning ceremony, as the Élysée Palace in Paris confirmed. The day is symbolic: German-French friendship is always celebrated on January 22nd. Nothing is known yet regarding participants from Austria.
