The mayor of Vianden, François Weyrich, does not reside in the municipality but in Germany, and should therefore be excluded from the council. That was the demand put to the Vianden municipal council on Wednesday. The discussion is not new, so the outcome of the vote came as little surprise.
Even ahead of the 2023 municipal elections, the then mayor of Vianden, Claude Tonino, had accused François Weyrich of not living in Vianden but at Château Kewenig in the German municipality of Körperich.
That he owns the château is no secret; there were several television reports and articles in the German media covering the Weyrich family’s renovation of the castle. These are also the primary sources cited by Councillor Jengel Klasen, who sent a letter of complaint to the Interior Ministry.
Jengel Klasen said that Mr. Weyrich publicly speaks about the matter and promotes it in interviews and on television, which is what prompted him to raise the issue. André Dübbers rejected this, calling the remarks insinuations.
Klasen responded that they were not insinuations and insisted the information is easily verifiable by watching Weyrich’s interviews, which, according to him, confirm the claim.
It was also noted that the Ministry of the Interior had already been informed about these interviews three years earlier. After reviewing the situation, the ministry concluded that François Weyrich, who owns a roofing company in Vianden, is officially a resident of the municipality.
Dübbers questioned why the topic was being brought up again now, but said he did not receive a clear explanation.
He asked what the purpose of the discussion was, suggesting it might simply be political manoeuvring or an attempt to provoke irritation.
Klasen replied that he did not need to explain his motives, arguing that Dübbers himself knew well how to provoke people, pointing to statements he had made before the elections.
Klasen then asked what proof existed that François Weyrich primarily lives in Vianden.
Dübbers responded that Weyrich is officially registered as a resident of the town. Another councillor, Pol Petry, added that Weyrich has a large apartment in Vianden which he himself had visited several times. However, Petry remarked that he was not an investigative journalist or someone who follows Weyrich around to monitor where he spends his time.
Councillor Jean-Claude Vinandy shared a personal anecdote to support the claim that Weyrich does live in Vianden. He explained that he often visits Weyrich early in the morning between 5am and 6am for coffee and has even joined him in the upstairs kitchen. From his experience, he said, Weyrich is regularly there at that time, which suggests that he stays there overnight.
Before the meeting, François Weyrich had informed the council in writing that his place of residence is in Vianden and that his eldest son lives with his family in Kewenig.
In the end, five of the six councillors present in the room at the time, François Weyrich had left at the very start of the discussion, voted in favour of allowing him to remain on the municipal council, with only Jengel Klasen voting against. During the discussion, Klasen had hinted that an administrative court might still need to look into the matter.
It should also be noted that François Weyrich will remain mayor of Vianden for just over a year before swapping roles with Councillor Pol Petry. This reshuffle had already been announced immediately after the municipal elections, though at the time it was planned for the midpoint of the legislative term. In the elections, Pol Petry had received more votes than François Weyrich.
