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GERMANY-POLITICS-CRISES
Three crises to rock Merkel since her re-election
BERLIN, Sept 23, 2018 (BSS/AFP) – In the year since Angela Merkel won re-
election to a fourth and probably final term as German chancellor, her
government has stumbled from crisis to crisis.
While Merkel remains one of the country’s most popular politicians after 13
years in power, her latest “grand coalition” has proved fragile and
fractious.
Its painful birth was the product of six months of tense negotiations
following the poll, setting the stage for a loveless union of rivals.
Immigration — and specifically Merkel’s decision not to close the border
to more than one million asylum seekers at the height of the refugee influx
in 2015-16 — continues to roil the political landscape.
Voter anxiety over the policy swelled support for the far-right Alternative
for Germany (AfD) party, which captured nearly 13 percent of the vote in the
September 24, 2017 general election.
Its disruptive presence has upended the balance of power in German politics
that had reigned for most of the post-World War II period, and exacerbated a
splintering of the party landscape.
Here is an overview of the three crises that nearly toppled Merkel this
year:
– Building a coalition –
Merkel’s conservative Christian Union bloc failed to capture a decisive win
in the general election, and their dismal 33 percent showing meant they
needed to seek a coalition partner.
The even weaker 20.5 percent result for the Social Democrats (SPD) led them
to reject a new partnership with Merkel, blaming her long shadow during the
previous four years of co-governance for letting them languish in the polls.
And an attempt for a groundbreaking tie-up with the ecologist Greens and
the pro-business Free Democrats dissolved in acrimony after weeks of talks.
So the only alternative to forming a ruling majority was to try to coax the
beleaguered SPD back into government, or demand voters return to the ballot
box.
The fraught marathon negotiations produced another awkward right-left grand
coalition, with Merkel in the shaky centre.
– Migrant row –
Trouble, however, was not far around the corner.
The most vocal critic of Merkel’s immigration policy within her
conservative camp, Horst Seehofer, insisted on taking control of a beefed-up
interior ministry.
From this perch, he nearly drove the administration into the abyss in July
with an ultimatum to turn away migrants at the German border with Austria.
Merkel was able to placate him with a pledge to forge bilateral agreements
with EU partner countries for migrant returns, but only after the coalition
had teetered on the brink for two weeks.
The deal also created the impression of a chancellor who could be
blackmailed, underlining the image of a weakened leader in the twilight of
her reign.
– Spy with far-right sympathies? –
The tenuous peace with Seehofer proved short-lived, as anti-migrant riots
in the eastern city of Chemnitz in late August provided a new test for the
government.
Merkel condemned the ugly scenes of neo-Nazis rampaging in the streets —
triggered by the fatal stabbing, allegedly by asylum seekers, of a German man
during a street brawl.
Singing from a very different song sheet, Seehofer said he wished he had
been able to take part in the angry protests against the killing and called
the immigration issue “the mother of all political problems” in a pointed
jibe at Merkel.
Days later, the head of the domestic intelligence agency, Hans-Georg
Maassen, gave an incendiary interview in which he questioned the veracity of
an amateur video from Chemnitz showing demonstrators chasing a dark-skinned
man on the street.
The remarks sparked an uproar and revived accusations that Maassen had far-
right sympathies. It was not long before the opposition and the SPD were
calling for his head.
Seehofer, however, staunchly defended Maassen, setting up yet another
showdown in Berlin.
The outcome, in which Maassen was removed from office but promoted to a
senior role in Seehofer’s ministry complete with a pay rise, satisfied
precisely no one — setting up the next bout of political turbulence.
The AfD gained two points out of the Maassen controversy to reach 18
percent support — making it the second most popular party in the country
after Merkel’s Christian Democrats.
The SPD slipped to a humiliating third place behind them, raising pointed
questions among its members about how long the party should continue to
haemorrhage support from within Merkel’s government.
BSS/AFP/GMR/0934 hrs