Anti-African racism by German football bureaucrat

This 4 September 2015 video from Germany says about itself:

Stand Up! Schalke legend Gerald Asamoah makes a powerful speech

Former Schalke hero Gerald Asamoah is calling on people toStand Up for refugees. Watch his message here as Schalke stars stand with him for the club’s campaign to help those in need.

Unfortunately, today we find out that there is not only corruption among German football fat cats. And not only anti-African racism among German military officers, or politicians of the neo-fascist AFD party.

Translated from Dutch NOS TV today:

Controversial statements by Schalke 04 boss Clemens Tönnies about Africans are keeping the mood in Germany busy for days. Tönnies, who is also active in business, was a guest speaker at a meeting with entrepreneurs last week.

He said it would be better to “build 20 power plants in Africa instead of increasing climate taxes.” He then said that “Africans can then stop cutting down trees and make children in the dark.”

Many fans and other Germans react surprised and angry at the statements. Because of the incident, Tönnies, the chairman of the supervisory board of the German football club, was suspended for three months last night.

Earlier in the evening, the honour council of the cult club based in Gelsenkirchen spoke about the incident. According to the council, this is not racism, but Tönnies has violated the club’s anti-discrimination rules. But many Schalke members say that does not go that far enough.

“Surprised, shocked and hurt”

Gerald Asamoah, the Ghanaian-born former player and current youth coach of Schalke, says he is speechless. “Tönnies’ comment surprised, shocked and hurt me,” he writes on Instagram.

View this post on Instagram

Ich bin ehrlich gesagt etwas sprachlos. Ich arbeite schon lange mit Clemens Tönnies zusammen und wir sind auch schon lange eng befreundet. Mir gegenüber hat er sich nie rassistisch verhalten. Seine Äußerung hat mich sehr überrascht, geschockt und auch verletzt. Klar ist, dass es nicht in Ordnung ist und es sich nicht gehört. Er beleidigt mich und alle anderen Betroffenen. Das können wir nicht dulden. Er hat mich persönlich angerufen und sich für sein Verhalten entschuldigt, nichts desto trotz werden wir uns zeitnah zusammensetzen, denn so etwas darf nicht passieren (!!) und es ist traurig, dass wir 2019 immer noch über so etwas sprechen müssen.

A post shared by Gerald Asamoah (@gerald.asamoah) on Aug 4, 2019 at 8:59am PDT

“He insults me and everyone else involved.” Asamoah also mentions his sadness that discussions about this kind of statements still have to be held in 2019.

Many fans are also baffled. They think their club should have labelled the speech as racist and point out that all efforts to combat racism in football are being destroyed. “Our credibility is gone”, a fan tweets, eg. …

The German Football Association (DFB) will also comment on the remarks by Tönnies, who owns a large meat processing company

Called Tönnies Lebensmittel.

in addition to his work at the club. The ethics committee will meet on 15 August to discuss the matter, reports the weekly Der Spiegel. The association cannot formally impose sanctions, but can only conduct an investigation.

The chairman of the sports committee of the German parliament, Dagmar Freitag, has also expressed her criticism of the statements. “If an entire continent and the accompanying population are tarred with the same brush, then I think there is racism and not just discrimination”, said the politician. “Such statements have a devastating impact on society, especially in these times.”