Germany: Greens eye power amid infighting in Merkel’s party

As Angela Merkel’s chancellor tenure winds up, infighting in her party sees Greens emerge as Germany’s strongest political force.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel. Picture: Michael Kappeler/Pool/AFP

The Green party could become the strongest political force in Germany as Angela Merkel’s centre-right bloc is consumed with infighting and her long tenure as chancellor draws to a close.

The Christian Democratic Union’s lead over its new rival has collapsed from 20 points to 2, polls suggest.

Within days the Green party is expected to unveil its leading candidate for the coming general election in the knowledge that he or she could be Germany’s first green chancellor.

The party’s new manifesto calls for a euros 500 billion spree of eco-friendly technology and infrastructure spending to help Germany stand its ground against the US and China, declaring that “one political era is coming to an end, and a new one can begin”.

After months of constructive opposition during the pandemic the party has also begun to channel public discontent against Merkel’s government. Robert Habeck, 51, its joint leader, declared that “every Green constituency association is better run than this country”.

Robert Habeck, right, and Annalene Baerbock, co-leaders of the German Greens Party. Picture: Sean Gallup/Getty Images

The strategy appears to be working: a recent poll put the CDU and its Bavarian ally, the Christian Social Union, on a combined 25 per cent of the vote, to the Greens’ 23 per cent.

The party is benefiting from the disarray on the centre right. Merkel, 66, who has ruled Germany since 2005, will retire after the autumn election but has no clear successor. The CDU’s new leader, Armin Laschet, 60, would normally have the strongest claim on the job but one poll indicated that only 23 per cent of Germans thought he was up to being chancellor, with 28 per cent believing Habeck would be better suited.

After two poor state election results Laschet is facing open rebellion from some of his party’s MPs, who have called on him to stand aside in favour of a more popular candidate such as Markus Soder, 54, chief minister of Bavaria. Even Merkel has publicly expressed frustration with Laschet and reminded her party that it “has no legal entitlement to the chancellery”.

The pair are at odds over how severe and broad a lockdown to deploy against the third Covid wave. In a television interview on Sunday night Merkel criticised Laschet, chief minister of North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany’s largest state by population, for shutting down only a handful of districts rather than the whole region.

Laschet has only a few weeks to rescue his chances of becoming chancellor. Yesterday (Monday) he stuck to his guns, insisting that his decision to keep shops open through rapid testing was correct, despite Merkel’s objections.

The Green party will seek to capitalise on these divisions while hoping to woo new voters with promises to rewild 2 per cent of Germany and ban new petrol and diesel cars by 2030. It also advocates economic reforms that include loosening the constitutional limit on government borrowing; introducing two new higher-rate bands of income tax; and raising corporation tax from 15 to 25 per cent.

The Times