Norbert Walter-Borjans (born 17 September 1952) is a German economist and politician of the

Social Democratic Party The name Social Democratic Party or Social Democrats has been used by many political parties in various countries around the world. Such parties are most commonly aligned to social democracy as their political ideology. Active parties For ...

(SPD) who served as co-leader of the SPD (alongside Saskia Esken) from

2019 File:2019 collage v1.png, From top left, clockwise: Hong Kong protests turn to widespread riots and civil disobedience; House of Representatives votes to adopt articles of impeachment against Donald Trump; CRISPR gene editing first used to experim ...

to 2021. He served as State Minister of Finance of

North Rhine-Westphalia North Rhine-Westphalia (german: Nordrhein-Westfalen, ; li, Noordrien-Wesfale ; nds, Noordrhien-Westfalen; ksh, Noodrhing-Wäßßfaale), commonly shortened to NRW (), is a state (''Land'') in Western Germany. With more than 18 million inha ...

from 2010 until 2017.

Early life and education

The son of a carpenter, Walter-Borjans was born 1952 in the West German city of

Krefeld Krefeld ( , ; li, Krieëvel ), also spelled Crefeld until 1925 (though the spelling was still being used in British papers throughout the Second World War), is a city in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It is located northwest of Düsseldorf, ...

and studied economics at the

University of Bonn The Rhenish Friedrich Wilhelm University of Bonn (german: Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn) is a public research university located in Bonn, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It was founded in its present form as the ( en, Rhine ...

and reached a PhD.

Political career

From 1991 until 1998, Walter-Borjans worked as spokesperson of the state government of North Rhine-Westphalia, then led by Minister-President

Johannes Rau Johannes Rau (; 16 January 193127 January 2006) was a German politician (SPD). He was the president of Germany from 1 July 1999 until 30 June 2004 and the minister president of North Rhine-Westphalia from 20 September 1978 to 9 June 1998. In th ...

. From 2010 to 2017 Walter-Borjans served as State Minister of Finance of North Rhine-Westphalia, in the

government A government is the system or group of people governing an organized community, generally a state. In the case of its broad associative definition, government normally consists of legislature, executive, and judiciary. Government i ...

of Minister-President Hannelore Kraft. In this capacity, he was one of the state's representatives in the Bundesrat, where he served on the Finance Committee. During his time in office, the state government – as main shareholder –, the German government and

Helaba Helaba, short for Landesbank Hessen-Thüringen, is a commercial bank with core regions in Hesse and Thuringia, Germany offering financial services to companies, banks, institutional investors and the public sector, both within Germany and interna ...

agreed to divide up the asset of ailing

WestLB WestLB AG (derived from ''Westdeutsche Landesbank'', i.e. "Western German state Bank") was a European commercial bank based in Düsseldorf, Germany which was mainly owned by the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia. Landesbanks are a group of pa ...

and cover any losses during the winding-down process. On Walter-Borjans's initiative, the state government on several occasions resorted to buying Swiss account data from whistle-blowers to pursue German tax dodgers. In the negotiations to form a ''

Grand Coalition A grand coalition is an arrangement in a multi-party parliamentary system in which the two largest political parties of opposing political ideologies unite in a coalition government. The term is most commonly used in countries where there are ...

'' of

Chancellor Chancellor ( la, cancellarius) is a title of various official positions in the governments of many nations. The original chancellors were the of Roman courts of justice—ushers, who sat at the or lattice work screens of a basilica or law cou ...

Angela Merkel Angela Dorothea Merkel (; ; born 17 July 1954) is a German former politician and scientist who served as Chancellor of Germany from 2005 to 2021. A member of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU), she previously served as Leader of the Opp ...

's Christian Democrats ( CDU together with the Bavarian

CSU CSU may refer to: * Channel service unit, a Wide area network equivalent of a network interface card * Chari Aviation Services, Chad, by ICAO airline code * Christian Social Union (UK), an Anglican social gospel organisation * Christian Social ...

) and the SPD following the 2013 federal elections, Walter-Borjans was part of the SPD delegation in the working group on financial policies and the national budget, led by

Wolfgang Schäuble Wolfgang Schäuble (; born 18 September 1942) is a German lawyer, politician and statesman whose political career has spanned for more than five decades. A member of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU), he is one of the longest-serving politi ...

and

Olaf Scholz Olaf Scholz (; born ) is a German politician who has served as the chancellor of Germany since 8 December 2021. A member of the Social Democratic Party (SPD), he previously served as Vice Chancellor under Angela Merkel and as Federal Minister ...

. Together with Saskia Esken, Walter-Borjans announced his candidacy for the

2019 Social Democratic Party of Germany leadership election The 2019 Social Democratic Party of Germany leadership election took place in the autumn of 2019 to elect the new leadership of the Social Democratic Party of Germany following the resignation of the Andrea Nahles on 3 June 2019. Although the lead ...

; the duo was soon endorsed by the SPD in North Rhine-Westphalia, the party's largest chapter, and its chairman

Sebastian Hartmann Sebastian Hartmann (born 7 July 1977) is a German politician of the Social Democratic Party (SPD) who has been serving as a member of the German Bundestag since 2013, representing the Rhein-Sieg-Kreis district. From 2018 until 2021, he also ser ...

. as well as the SPD youth organization and its leader Kevin Kühnert, which account for some 80,000 of the 430,000 SPD members. The November 2019 run-off was won by Esken and Walter-Borjans. Walter-Borjans was nominated by his party as delegate to the Federal Convention for the purpose of electing the

President of Germany The president of Germany, officially the Federal President of the Federal Republic of Germany (german: link=no, Bundespräsident der Bundesrepublik Deutschland),The official title within Germany is ', with ' being added in international corres ...

2022 File:2022 collage V1.png, Clockwise, from top left: Road junction at Yamato-Saidaiji Station several hours after the assassination of Shinzo Abe; Anti-government protest in Sri Lanka in front of the Presidential Secretariat; The global monkeypo ...

Other activities

Corporate boards

* NRW.BANK, Ex-Officio Member of the Supervisory Board (2012–2017) * Portigon, Ex-Officio Member of the Supervisory Board (2012–2017) *

RAG AG RAG AG, formerly Ruhrkohle AG, is the largest German coal mining corporation. The company headquarters are in Essen in the Ruhr area. The company was founded on 27 November 1968, consolidating several coalmining corporations into the Ruhrkohl ...

, Ex-Officio Member of the Supervisory Board (2012–2017) *

KfW The KfW, which together with its subsidiaries DEG, KfW IPEX-Bank and FuB forms the KfW Bankengruppe ("banking group"), is a German state-owned investment and development bank, based in Frankfurt. As of 2014, it is the world's largest national d ...

, Ex-Officio Member of the Board of Supervisory Directors (2010–2017)

Non-profit organizations

* ''

Deutschlandradio Deutschlandradio (DLR) (''Radio Germany'') is a national German public radio broadcaster. History ''Deutschlandfunk'' was originally a West German news radio targeting listeners within West Germany as well as in neighbouring countries, ''Deutsc ...

'', Member of the Broadcasting Council (2012–2017)Wilfried Goebels (12 November 2012)
Finanzminister Walter-Borjans ist Multifunktionär in Aufsichtsräten
'' General-Anzeiger''. * Verkehrsclub Deutschland, Founding Member

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Walter-Borjans Living people 1952 births People from Krefeld Social Democratic Party of Germany politicians University of Bonn alumni University of Cologne alumni