Helmut Kohl

Dr. Helmut Kohl (full name Helmut Josef Michael Kohl) (born 3 April 1930) is a German conservative politician and statesman. He was Chancellor of Germany from 1982 to 1998 (West Germany between 1982 and 1990) and also the leader of the Christian-Democratic Union (CDU) party from 1973-1998.

Political Career

Kohl joined the CDU in 1947. He then went on to earn a doctorate (ph.d.) in history. From 1969-1976 he was Minister-President of the Rhineland-Palatinate state, after which he became a member of the Federal Parliament to be the leader of the CDU opposition against the government led by the Social Democratic Party (SPD) of the time. He was the CDU's candidate for Chancellor in the 1976 federal elections, which the SPD won.

Related Topics:
Doctorate - 1969 - 1976 - Minister-President - Rhineland-Palatinate - Federal Parliament - Social Democratic Party - 1976 federal elections

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On October 1, 1982, he succeeded Helmut Schmidt as Chancellor by means of a Constructive Vote of No Confidence, the only one in post-war German history that was successful to date. Especially in the earlier days of his tenure, Kohl faced stiff opposition from the German political left. His adversaries frequently referred to him by the widely known disparaging nickname of "Birne" (German word for pear; after unflattering cartoons showing Kohl's head as a pear). Such initially common public ridicule however subsided somewhat over time and in the later years of Kohl's tenure the moniker was rarely used anymore.

Related Topics:
October 1 - 1982 - Helmut Schmidt - Constructive Vote of No Confidence

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Kohl holds the record of being the longest-serving Chancellor of Germany since Otto von Bismarck, and was succeeded by Gerhard Schröder on October 27, 1998 after a landslide victory of the SPD in the 1998 federal elections.

Related Topics:
Otto von Bismarck - Gerhard Schröder - October 27 - 1998 - 1998 federal elections

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German reunification

Kohl is widely recognized even by some of his political adversaries for managing the process of German reunification that started with the fall of the Berlin Wall on November 9, 1989, and formally completed on October 3, 1990.

Related Topics:
German reunification - Berlin Wall - November 9 - October 3 - 1990

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Prior to reunification, Kohl followed the principles of Ostpolitik by welcoming a state visit by East German leader Erich Honecker in 1987, the first meeting since the end of WWII between the heads of state of the two Germanys. As communism in East Germany crumbled, Kohl persuaded the leadership of the Soviet Union to accept the idea of a reunited Germany remaining in the NATO alliance.

Related Topics:
Ostpolitik - East German - Erich Honecker - 1987 - Soviet Union - NATO

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While not all has been well economically in Germany during and since his government, most people would agree that Kohl managed to convince international leaders that a unified Germany would represent no threat to its neighbors by tying German reunification with the tighter integration of Germany into the European Union.

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Party funding scandal

Despite his earlier successes, Kohl's political heritage was damaged by a massive party financing scandal starting in 1999, when it was discovered that the CDU had received and maintained illegal funding under his leadership.

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Investigations by the German Parliament into the sources of illegal CDU funds, mainly stored in Geneva bank accounts, revealed two sources:

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• Sales of German tanks to Saudi Arabia (kickback question),
• Privatization fraud in collusion with the late French President François Mitterrand who wanted 2,550 unused allotments in the former East Germany for the then French owned Elf Aquitaine.
  

In December 1994 the CDU majority in the Bundestag enacted a law that nullified all rights of the current owners. Over 300 million DM in illegal funds were discovered in accounts in the canton Geneva. The fraudulently acquired allotments were then privatized as part of Elf Aquitaine and ended up with TotalFinaElf after amalgamation. The land package then entered what is now TOTAL SA.

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Kohl himself claimed that Elf Aquitaine has offered (and meanwhile made) a massive investment in East Germany's chemical industry together with the takeover of 2,000 gas stations in Germany which were formerly owned by national oil company Minol. Elf Aquitaine is supposed to have financed CDU illegally as ordered by François Mitterrand, as it was usual practice in African countries.

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In 2003 it became known that Helmut Kohl was paid 300,000 ? (then 600,000 Deutsche Mark) by private television mogul Leo Kirch for an advisory contract. This became a rather delicate matter, considering the fact that Leo Kirch had only been put into the position to build his private television empire as a result of reforms championed by Helmut Kohl in the 1980s.

Related Topics:
2003 - Leo Kirch - 1980s

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