The Schalke chairman, Clemens Tönnies, has stepped down after 19 years amid a Covid-19 outbreak at one of his meat factories and following a dismal Bundesliga season for the club.
Fans had been demanding for months that Tönnies, a billionaire meat producer, resign, with the team in freefall after the winter break. On Tuesday he decided to leave.
He had already infuriated many supporters last year with comments linking climate change with overpopulation in Africa, which were ruled as racist by the German FA, and he stepped down voluntarily for three months at the time.
He again hit the headlines 10 days ago when more than 1,000 employees at one of his meat processing plants tested positive for coronavirus, prompting local health authorities to order all 6,500 of his workers and their families to go into quarantine.
The localised lockdown was a setback for Germany’s reopening strategy. To top a difficult 12 months for the 64-year-old Tönnies, who had been on the Schalke board for 26 years, the team finished in 12th place in the Bundesliga last week, missing out on European football after setting a club record of 16 successive league games without a win.
“We as a board regret the decision of Clemens Tönnies,” the Schalke deputy chairman, Jens Buchta, said in a statement. “As chairman he left his mark on the board with a mix of dynamism and down-to-earthness. He was often the motor that started and accompanied new processes.”
