Despite the appointment of Evelyn Palla as the new CEO of Deutsche Bahn AG, considerable uncertainty persists within the company and amongst the governing coalition in Berlin regarding the future direction of the national rail operator.
A central point of contention revolves around the degree of separation planned for InfraGo, the company’s infrastructure division, from the broader DB AG conglomerate. According to reports in “Der Spiegel”, alterations to the “Agenda for Satisfied Customers on the Rail” spearheaded by Federal Transport Minister Patrick Schnieder (CDU), have further fueled these anxieties.
Recent information suggests a draft version of Palla’s official introduction included a provision stipulating that the InfraGo supervisory board chairmanship would remain with a DB AG corporate board member. This measure, ostensibly intended to “secure the connection to the integrated group” would have represented a compromise with both the railway union EVG and the SPD, who have expressed reservations regarding a complete separation of infrastructure operations.
However, this clause is absent from the final version of the agenda publicly released by Minister Schnieder. Questions are now being asked about whether this omission indicates a deliberately softened approach to the planned disentanglement of InfraGo. The Transport Ministry declined to comment on the matter when approached for clarification, stating that “the final version published by the Federal Transport Minister is the only version that holds significance.
Representatives from EVG and the SPD have refrained from commenting on the altered document, likely to avoid escalating potential conflicts with Minister Schnieder, who recently faced setbacks in his attempt to appoint former rail manager Dirk Rompf as the new head of InfraGo.
