CSV MEP Frank Engel had caused controversy on social media on Friday 1 September when he posted a status on Facebook in which he talked about the “the greatest purge in the civil service since the civil administration--and I choose my words carefully.”

The “civil administration” refers to the period when Luxembourg was under Nazi occupation and the civil service was purged of Jews, communists and dissidents. Some people, including the DP, argued that he compared the current democratic government to the Nazi period; Engel argued that the word “since” meant he referred to the last 70 years.

Engel seemed to agree to take back the reference to the civil administration period, but not the charge that civil servants who were close to the government’s parties had been promoted, and those who were not so close had been demoted. Engel wrote on 2 September:

“this is wrong and gives the impression that the state is a self-service for those who are currently at its helm. This is bad for our democracy.”

The DP has since asked the CSV chair and lead candidate to distance themselves from Engel’s statements. CSV chair Marc Spautz conceded only that Engel “had not chosen his words wisely.”

The prime minister published a Facebook statement on Monday 4 September:

“I emphatically refute the general suspicion that has been thrown on the civil service. With words like ‘purge’ and hints to German times in Luxembourg history, a statement has recently been made to put in doubt the obligation to neutrality of members of the civil service. It is unacceptable that a member of a party which had government responsibility for decades, propagates such a depiction of the civil service. The government has either confirmed or replaced people at their post since its coming into office. Some people got other responsibilities at their wish and there are certainly other civil servants who were nominated to responsible posts, who had other responsibilities beforehand. The government makes no difference between people who get involved politically in their free time and those who do not.”

He continued:

“As prime minister and minister of state, I think that every person who serves the general public, be it politically, socially or in another way, deserves respect. There are no ‘party civil servants’ for me. I can say that for myself and the ministries for which I am responsible, I have an incredibly engaged and devoted team. Among them are people who are members of the current opposition and elected in local councils, as there are people who are close to other parties or have no affiliation. I do not see a difference in their motivation and their understanding of serving the public.”

Bettel clarified that:

“The political representatives in government, parliament and at local level have a responsibility towards those people who took an oath on the constitution. Civil servants and state employees must be able to do their work free from party political insinuation and cannot become a pawn in the political debate.”

On RTL, Frank Engel said that:

“for the past 70 years, we have had these rules for the cooperation between parties and in the dealings with the civil service. There has never been, over the past 70 years, such a wave, not of nominations (which happened often), but of the contrary. Never have people been removed because they belonged to the wrong party, and that is a new quality.”

He added that:

“I would not use that term again because I see to what it leads. People think I did something that is not right, which of course it wouldn’t be if it had happened. I didn’t do that, as I have said before.”