Brandenburg’s government is auctioning off this pair of Korean dolls Photo: State Government of Brandenburg
By Michael Sauerbier
Three, two, one – mine! Vases, plates, desk clocks – Brandenburg’s head of government has the gifts of his state guests auctioned off. The auction catalog is now online.
Politely accepted and forgotten. Prime Minister Dietmar Woidke (61, SPD) only endures the fewest gifts in his Potsdam office. Ties, pictures and figurines end up in the log department’s warehouse – and soon on the auction table.
A “duck” (Citroën 2V) made of coke cans: the hit in every toy car collection – but not in a Brandenburg ministerial office in Tesla times Photo: State Government of Brandenburg
The state government is auctioning off 178 useless gifts at Brandenburg Day on September 2nd and 3rd in Finsterwalde. For a good cause: the profit goes to the charity for the needy. Only expensive pieces that fetch more than 250 euros reduce the 21 billion euro mountain of debt.
Ex-Prime Minister Dr. Manfred Stolpe 1991 by Argentina’s President Photo: State Government of Brandenburg
A glance at the auction catalog primarily shows decorative dust collectors of all kinds: model cars, excavators and locomotives, coins, mugs and old CDs. A useless hodgepodge like scrap Santa. The selection shows what many guests think of Brandenburg: apparently not much.
Only a few items are of value: Chinese porcelain vases, Japanese dolls, Armenian silver coins, precious stones from Brazil, a pearl necklace with earrings. If you want to bid on them, you have to go to Finsterwalde with cash. Card payment is not accepted.
The mining union gave this miner’s lamp to the country in 1996. The symbol of the coal miners – although Brandenburg only has open opencast mines and no pits Photo: State Government of Brandenburg