A fiasco in the small east German state of Thuringia has tipped the leader of the CDU over the edge
GERMAN POLITICS is in disarray after the sudden announcement that Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer, leader of the ruling centre-right Christian Democratic Union , intends to resign. On February 10th Ms Kramp-Karrenbauer said she would quit her role as party chairwoman and not seek the CDU’s nomination to be chancellor-candidate at the next general election, due in autumn 2021.
Last October an election in the state had delivered a majority of seats to parties of the hard left and right, making it difficult to form a coalition. Amid complicated parliamentary manoeuvring, on February 5th Thomas Kemmerich, leader of a small liberal party, was elected state premier with votes from the CDU and the nationalist Alternative for Germany . No state leader had ever relied on AfD support to take office, and there was an immediate backlash in Berlin.
Mr Kemmerich resigned within days, but inside the CDU the damage was done. Ms Kramp-Karrenbauer advertised her own impotence by announcing that she had urged her colleagues in Thuringia not to vote for Mr Kemmerich, to no effect. Mrs Merkel’s interventions only made her protégée look weaker; as party business, Thuringia should have been Ms Kramp-Karrenbauer’s problem to solve.
But she was also unhappy about Mrs Merkel’s decision in 2018 to split the roles of CDU leadership and chancellor-candidate, which she suggested had weakened the party. The search for a successor may help resolve that. The next CDU leader, who should be chosen by the summer , will be well placed to lead the party into the 2021 election.
What conclusions should be drawn from this debacle? First, Mrs Merkel’s careful succession plans lie in ruins, diminishing the chancellor’s authority yet further. Second, German politics are likely to remain inward-looking for the best part of two years; bad news for the French and others who had hoped that Germany’s presidency of the EU Council, in the second half of 2020, might help unlock some deadlocked European problems.
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