Although the inner circle is male-dominated, Mr Scholz is reputed to encourage women colleagues. Others in Mr Scholz’s core line-up include Steffen Hebestreit, his official spokesman Jörg Kukies, his top economic adviser and go-to person for European affairs and Jens Plötner, a smooth former diplomat who serves as his foreign-policy adviser. But the broadness of Mr Schmidt’s portfolio-he is chief of the chancellery’s 600-plus staff, and has some oversight of national intelligence and communication strategy-can make him appear more of a fireman and salesman than a policymaker. Mr Schmidt makes up for the chancellor’s quiet reticence with equal and opposite ebullience, working phones and Berlin’s bars until the early hours. So close is the odd couple-one big and bearded, the other bald and compact-that a columnist tellingly tagged them “Wolaf”. Unusually for a world leader, Mr Scholz expects to be home for an undisturbed dinner with his wife every day, followed by a good book and an early bed.Ĭhief among the praetorian guard that surrounds the chancellor is Wolfgang Schmidt, a former lawyer who has been Mr Scholz’s right-hand man for 20 years, starting with local politics in their hometown of Hamburg. In contrast to his predecessor, Angela Merkel, who tended to arrive at meetings first, leave last and in-between spend hours chatting across a wide network, the current chancellor likes his meetings short and narrow, preferably one-on-one. The problem lies partly with Mr Scholz’s own high and dry style, and partly with the tightness of the ship he runs.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |