On 1 July 1990, the day of the currency union, Chancellor Helmut Kohl spoke on television about the eastern states. Durch eine gemeinsame Anstrengung wird es uns gelingen, through a joint effort we will succeed, in turning them schon bald wieder in blühende Landschaften, soon into blooming landscapes again, where it is worth living and working. In 1991 he said he was more convinced than ever that this would happen within three to four years. The phrase was later used ironically, and the journalist Klaus Wiegrefe wrote of Kohls Lüge von den blühenden Landschaften, Kohl’s lie of the blooming landscapes.