Stéphane Beemelmans

Stéphane Beemelmans next to Ursula von der Leyen , 2014

Stéphane Beemelmans (born September 20, 1965 in Toulouse ) is a German lobbyist and former political official . From 1994 to 2005 in the Saxon civil service and from 1999 in various functions for Thomas de Maizière , he was one of the two state secretaries in the Federal Ministry of Defense and responsible for administration and equipment from March 16, 2011 . After several unresolved affairs over armaments payments, he was put into temporary retirement on February 20, 2014 by the Federal President at the request of the new Defense Minister Ursula von der Leyen .

Life

Beemelmans is the son of the German diplomat Hubert Beemelmans and a French teacher. He grew up in Bonn and passed his Abitur at the Aloisiuskolleg in Bonn-Bad Godesberg in 1983 . He then studied law at the University of Bonn from 1983 to 1989 . From 1985 to 1986 he did his military service in the French army . Here he reached the rank of lieutenant; today he is first lieutenant in the reserve. In 1994 he passed his second state examination in law.

He began his professional career in Saxony, where he became one of Thomas de Maizière's closest collaborators. From April 1994 to August 1997 he was a consultant at the Saxon State Ministry for Social Affairs, Health and Family . From September 1997 to August 1998 he was a European representative at the Saxon state representation at the federal government. From September 1998 to February 2001 he was the personal assistant to the then head of the Saxon State Chancellery . From March 2001 to December 2002 he was head of division and press spokesman in the Saxon Ministry of Finance . From January 2003 to June 2005 he was director of the state enterprise State Palaces, Castles and Gardens of Saxony and then moved from July to November 2005 to the management office in the Saxon Ministry of the Interior .

From November 2005 to November 2009 he was the office manager of the head of the Federal Chancellery . At the end of 2009, he changed as head of the Department of Fundamental Issues; EU and international affairs; New federal states in the Federal Ministry of the Interior . When de Maizière moved to the Ministry of Defense, he put the civil servant State Secretary Walther Otremba into temporary retirement and took Beemelman's successor to the Ministry of Defense in mid-March 2011. According to his own account, Beemelmans was primarily responsible for the “ Euro Hawk Affair ” in 2013 ; the purchase of drones of the type RQ-4E Euro Hawk might have resulted because of a known problem since 2007 Admission to retrofit cost of more than half a billion euros. Nevertheless, the project was only discontinued in 2013.

After the federal election in 2013, it was initially suspected that Beemelmans would move to the Ministry of the Interior with Thomas de Maizière, as he had been his close confidante since 1999 , when he was in the Saxon State Chancellery and then as an office manager in the Federal Chancellery, as a department head in the Ministry of the Interior and as Permanent State Secretary to the Ministry of Defense followed. Instead, Beemelmans remained in the Ministry of Defense under Ursula von der Leyen , the new minister from mid-December 2013. After he had not informed the outgoing Minister de Maizière or the Bundestag of the adjustment of a Eurofighter order and was unable to justify the cost increases for a total of 15 armaments projects on February 19 on an armaments board appointed as a result, he was only three months after his confirmation dismissed von der Leyen.

At the end of November 2014 it was announced that Beemelmans will take over the post of managing director at the lobby agency EUTOP Berlin GmbH on December 1st . Since November 2016 he has been the managing director of PD - Consultants of the Public Hand GmbH (formerly ÖPP Deutschland AG), which, according to the will of the federal government, has been promoting the creation of public-private partnerships since 2008 . When he joined, he converted the previous stock corporation, from which all business people and corporations withdrew as shareholders, into a 100% public limited company, which was due to the violent criticism of the involvement of lobbyists from the private sector.

Stéphane Beemelmans is married, Catholic and has one child.

criticism

In the spring of 2013, the " Euro-Hawk affair " became public; the Bundestag formed a committee of inquiry. On July 30, 2013, Beemelmans said before this committee: "I am responsible for his [Defense Minister de Mazière] lack of information". He only informed de Maizière on May 13, 2013 about the failure of the project. “I informed him as I saw fit. I have found out that he thought more was necessary. ”He sees“ even in retrospect the minister is not responsible for anything ”with regard to information about the course of the project. Voices from the opposition suspect a pawn sacrifice .

On February 19, 2014, Beemelmans came under renewed criticism when it became known that he and Rüdiger Wolf , as state secretaries, approved a compensation payment to the turbine manufacturer MTU of € 55 million from the reduction in Eurofighter orders at the end of December 2013 , without to inform the budget committee of the Bundestag about this in accordance with regulations. Although this had not yet been reinstated after the federal election , the main committee, which was set up temporarily, was not informed . One possible reason cited was that the cheap deal should definitely be completed in 2013. The next day this led to his release.

Web links

Commons : Stéphane Beemelmans  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Personnel changes in top military and civilian positions ; Ministry of Defense press release of April 20, 2011; Retrieved February 20, 2014
2. ^ ^{A b c} Gordon Repinski: Armaments affair : Von der Leyen fires State Secretary ; Spiegel Online, February 20, 2014
3. ^ Andreas Baumann: Bonn Frenchman forges Berlin plans ; General-Anzeiger Bonn, March 22, 2012
4. ^ Peter Heimann, Sven Siebert: The Lieutenant de réserve from Dresden ; Saxon newspaper from March 18, 2011
5. ^ Beemelmans succeeds Otremba: De Maizière makes close confidante State Secretary ; dpa report in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, March 8, 2011
6. ^ Beemelmans becomes State Secretary in the BMVg ; Brief curriculum vitae in Politics & Communication ; Retrieved February 20, 2014.
7. ↑ Stéphane Beemelmans appointed State Secretary of the Federal Ministry of Defense ; Press release from the Federal Ministry of Defense of March 16, 2011
8. ↑ Two new parliamentary state secretaries in the Bendlerblock - does a civil servant work? ( Memento of the original from February 22, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Kuttenmonsters & newsdependents Bundeswehr Blog, December 15, 2013. 
9. ^ SZ-Online: Beemelmans remains State Secretary in the Federal Ministry of Defense ; Report in the Süddeutsche Zeitung from December 16, 2013.
10. ^ ^{A b} Matthias Gebauer: Armaments project "Eurofighter": Ministry of Defense released millions without a vote in the Bundestag. Spiegel Online , February 19, 2014, accessed February 19, 2014 . 
11. ↑ https://lobbypedia.de/wiki/EUTOP
12. ↑ parliamentwatch.de: Spicy change of sides: Confidante of Interior Minister de Maizière becomes managing director of a lobby agency on November 25, 2014.
13. ^ Website of the PPP Germany. ( Memento of the original from November 11, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Retrieved November 11, 2016.  
14. ^ "Euro Hawk" Committee: State Secretary takes responsibility in drone affair ; Spiegel Online, July 30, 2013.
15. ↑ State Secretary exonerates De Maizière ; Manager Magazin Online, July 30, 2013