Protests and incidents have the general meeting of the Volkswagen-Group on Wednesday in Berlin sensitively disturbed. During the introductory words of the chairman of the supervisory board, Hans Dieter Pötsch, a person threw an object onto the podium. Apparently, the representative of the owner families, Wolfgang Porsche, to be hit. However, that didn’t work. Pötsch briefly interrupted his speech and continued after the security forces intervened. Afterwards, a pulpy mass could be seen on the white band in front of Porsche’s place on the podium.
Later, a shirtless activist disrupted CEO Oliver Blume’s speech with loud shouts and a poster: The object of the criticism was VW’s adherence to the Chinese plant in Xinjiang province. The woman was led out of the meeting hall by security forces. Blume then continued with his remarks. Later, too, there was a short interruption of the meeting by loud shouting.
The VW plant in Xinjiang has been criticized for a long time. People also demonstrated against it in front of the assembly building. According to human rights organizations, the Muslim Uyghur minority living in the province is being specifically suppressed by the government in Beijing. VW is accused of not doing enough against alleged forced labor at local suppliers. VW counters that there are no signs of human rights violations in the plant.
Climate protection activists block access
The access to the shareholders’ meeting of the Volkswagen Group at the Berlin exhibition center has been blocked by climate protection demonstrators. A police spokesman said six people blocked roads in two places on Wednesday morning. At one point, on Messedamm, they had “concreted themselves in”. The climate protection protest group Last Generation announced that, together with other groups, the VW general meeting had been disrupted in order to protest against VW’s inadequate climate policy. Road blockades were directed against the access routes to the exhibition grounds.
Even without the protests at the current Annual General Meeting, Volkswagen’s management can look back on a turbulent year. Among other things, the longtime boss had to Herbert Diess (64) at the top of the group to give way to the younger Porsche boss Oliver Blume (54). Blume is supposed to teach the car giant more team spirit again – but also to get operational problems at the ailing software development subsidiary Cariad under control, as well as the ailing business in the former VW bastion China boost again.
In addition, numerous investors complained about the comparatively weak price development of their shares during the general meeting. While the IPO of the sports car subsidiary Porsche is considered a success on the market – the Porsche preference share has increased by more than 30 percent since the start – the Volkswagen preference share, which is also listed in the Dax, has made no progress.
Head of VW and Porsche: Criticism of Blume’s dual role
It should be mentioned again that Blume wants to run the VW Group and Porsche at the same time on a permanent basis. This had caused frowns not only among experts on good corporate governance.
In addition, the re-election of Supervisory Board members is pending, including the family representative Wolfgang Porsche. He has already exceeded the standard age limit of 75 years that applies to the board. Since he is one of the largest shareholders, the Supervisory Board nevertheless recommends his re-election. Porsche will be 80 years old on the day of the Annual General Meeting and is to return to the board for a full five-year term.
The majorities at Volkswagen are clearly distributed. The holding company of the Porsche and Piëch families, Porsche SE, holds 53 percent, ahead of the state of Lower Saxony with 20 percent and the sovereign wealth fund from Qatar with 17 percent. The preferred shareholders, on the other hand, have no voting rights.