But five months on and there has been no word or timetable about when legal stores might be opened, and pro-cannabis activists are getting impatient at what they consider unnecessary foot-dragging.
Montana is a former soldier who said he used cannabis to cope with the symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder.
A spokesman for Burkhard Blienert, the federal commissioner for drugs and addiction, said that several ministries have to be included in framing the law, listing the Agriculture, Economy, Finance, Justice and Foreign ministries as examples.
Müller has absolutely no time for such arguments.
A study published last year by the Heinrich Heine University in Düsseldorf calculated that dealing with cannabis-related crime incurred €1.63 billion in police costs in 2020, plus €444.7 million in court costs.
“It’s about creating a regulated market with the aim of pushing back and ultimately destroying the black market,” he told DW.
Medicinal cannabis has been legal in Germany since 2017, and, in practice, many cannabis-related prosecutions in Germany are dropped by state prosecutors because the amounts involved are so low.