Merkel Announces She Won't Seek Re-election Amid Disastrous Immigration Policies
pressure from citizens mounts over her disastrous immigration policies
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German Chancellor Angela Merkel has announced she will not seek re-election when her mandate ends in 2021 as pressure from citizens mounts over her disastrous immigration policies.
Merkel stated at a press conference that she would not see re-election as party chairwoman in December, igniting a desperate race to replace her as Christian Democrat candidate in 2021.
Last week, Neon Nettle reported that over half of German citizens living under Angela Merkel's open-border regime want to leave the country, according to Die Welt - referring to a YouGov survey commissioned by financial services provider Transferwise.
Merkel's new immigration law to make it more accessible from foreign workers outside the EU to find jobs in the country backfired as many voters have already condemned the move.
Whoever comes after Merkel will likely be someone who will listen to what the German citizens are saying, if not, it will be another recipe for disaster.
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According to the Guardian: German media reported that Friedrich Merz, a former parliamentary leader of the CDU/CSU alliance, was also joining the race to succeed Merkel.
Other picks are the health minister Jens Spahn and the state premier of North Rhine-Westphalia, Armin Laschet.
The German news agency DPA stated that Merkel intended to continue as chancellor for now.
Traditionally, the person who holds the position of party chair of the government’s largest party also takes the position of chancellor, but this is not a binding rule.
Earlier Merkel has said the two jobs belong together.
Merkel’s predecessor, Gerhard Schröder, made the same move in February 2004, giving up the position of chairman but remaining chancellor until November 2005.
At the time, Merkel, who was the leader of the opposition, spoke of a “loss of authority all along the line,” and “the beginning of the end” of Schröder.
Christian Lindner, the leader of the liberal FDP party, was the first to demand Merkel’s resignation as chancellor on the back of the news, calling for her ruling conservative bloc to “be prepared for a real new beginning in Germany.”
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Merkel’s CDU allies, however, seem ready to accept her judgment to stay on as chancellor for now.
The former president of the German parliament Norbert Lammert told Die Welt it was acceptable as part of a “transition phase,” whereas the head of the CDU in the German state of Thuringia, Mike Mohring, spoke of a “turning point.”
Others welcomed the chance for renewal in the party.
The advancements on Monday came after the CDU hemorrhaged support in a vote in the western state of Hesse.
Preliminary final results from Sunday’s election, seen as decisive for the future of Germany’s increasingly shaky coalition, showed the CDU slumping to 27%, the party’s serious showing in the state since 1966 and a drop of 11 percentage points since Hesse last went to the polls in 2013.
Merkel’s coalition partner in Berlin, the Social Democrats (SPD), tanked to 19.8% in a dead heat with the resurgent Green party for second place. The result, the SPD’s worst since 1946, also piled pressure on the party leader, Andrea Nahles.
After news of Merkel’s decision not to stand for re-election as leader of the CDU, Nahles ruled out a change in leadership in her party.
“A personnel configuration is not being discussed in the SPD,” she told journalists on Monday morning.
The euro fell to session lows on Monday.
Merkel’s weakness at home may restrict her capacity to lead in the EU at a time when the bloc is dealing with Brexit, a budget crisis in Italy and the prospect of populist parties making gains at European Parliament elections next May.
The trouncing for the German coalition parties on Sunday came shortly after a destructive result in Bavaria, widely seen as a protest against the failings of the Berlin government.
The Hesse result will be seen as further evidence of the shrinking of the mainstream political landscape across Germany and Europe more widely.
