Charges that the chairman of Parliament’s Restitution Committee is taking advantage of his position by acting as attorney for some 30, 000 restitution claimants, some of whom are charged fees of as high as 45 percent of the payments they receive, were aired yesterday in the Bundestag, lower house of Parliament, here.
The accusation was made against Social Democratic deputy Otto Greve by deputy Jacob Diel, a member of Chancellor Adenauer’s Christian Democratic Party. This “restitution scandal” is attracting wide attention in view of the fact that some West German politicians have been contending that the entire policy of paying compensation to former victims of Nazism should be reviewed, because, they say, “the costs are too high.”
Greve has denied that he represents 30, 000 compensation clients. He insists that he is attorney, in his private law practice, for about 50 compensation applicants. However, he has conceded that indirectly, through other attorneys, he has been authorized to act as counsel for about 7, 000 or 8, 000 other clients living abroad. Diel is demanding that a special parliamentary investigation be authorized by the Bundestag and that, meanwhile, Greve be removed from the Restitution Committee chairmanship.
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