Scholz’s wife steps down as minister in German state
Posted Apr 17, 2023 10:30:06 AM.
BERLIN (AP) — German Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s wife said Monday that she is stepping down as the education minister of the region where the couple lives, citing disagreement in her party over a policy proposal.
Britta Ernst, 62, has been education minister in the eastern state of Brandenburg, which surrounds Berlin, since 2017. Like Scholz, she is a member of the center-left Social Democrats.
Ernst said it had always been “a great honor and pleasure” to lead her ministry. But she told reporters in the state capital, Potsdam, that “great unity” is needed to deal with the challenges it faces.
In a separate, written statement, she pointed to disagreement in the ranks of the local Social Democrats over her proposal to deal with a shortage of teachers. She said she was resigning “so that a new attempt can be made with a new person at the head of the ministry to deal with this challenge for schools in Brandenburg.”
Ernst is being replaced as education minister by Steffen Freiberg, who until now was her deputy. A state election in Brandenburg is due in the fall of 2024.
Ernst’s work is separate from that of her husband, who was the mayor of Hamburg from 2011 to 2018 before returning to federal politics as finance minister. In Germany, education is almost entirely the responsibility of the country’s 16 state governments.
Ernst was a member of the state legislature in her native Hamburg from 1997 to 2011. She was the education minister of the northern state of Schleswig-Holstein from 2014 until a center-left government in that region lost power in 2017.
Brandenburg governor Dietmar Woidke said he regretted Ernst’s resignation and said she led her ministry “with vision and a steady hand in difficult times,” including the COVID-19 pandemic.
The Associated Press
