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Angela Merkel tells party leaders she will stand for re-election in 2017 Angela Merkel tells party leaders she will stand for re-election in 2017
(about 3 hours later)
The German chancellor, Angela Merkel, has told her party she will seek re-election in 2017 in a move likely to be welcomed in many capitals as a sign of stability following unexpected poll triumphs for Brexit and Donald Trump. Angela Merkel has announced she will run for a fourth term as German chancellor in a crucial national election next September, insisting the decision had not been easy to make because of the complex challenges she will face and “absurd” expectations Germany could take a world leadership role when Barack Obama leaves office.
After months of speculation, Merkel announced at a meeting with other leaders of her conservative Christian Democratic Union (CDU) party that she would run for a fourth term, a decision met with thunderous applause, party sources said. “I have spent an unending amount of time contemplating this, as to stand as a candidate for a fourth time after 11 years in power is anything other than a trivial decision, neither for the country, for the party, nor for me,” Merkel told a press conference in Berlin on Sunday night in what was a much anticipated announcement.
Merkel is due to hold a news conference on Sunday evening when she will talk further about her decision. She said just as when she first took up the post in 2005, she wanted to serve Germany. “Ever since then I have tried to orientate myself according to this principle.”
Merkel, 62, has governed Europe’s top economic power since 2005. The 62-year-old has been in power since 2005 and is considered globally as the most experienced and longest-serving leader of the western world. She will be looked to for many answers to current challenges, including how to shape relations with Europe and the United States under Donald Trump, how the European Union will manage a Brexit and dealing with Russian aggression.
Another full four-year mandate would tie the postwar record set by her mentor Helmut Kohl, who presided over the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989. The continuing influx of refugees into Europe as well as the ongoing euro crisis are among the major issues that will dominate her next term.
With no clear successor in her party, Merkel represents “stability and reliability in turbulent times because she holds society together and stands up to oversimplification” by populists, the CDU deputy leader, Julia Klöckner, told the newspaper Welt am Sonntag. “She stands for moderation and centrism instead of cheap headlines.” Appearing relaxed but typically self-contained, Merkel said the decision would depend on the state of her health but assured her audience she felt “wide awake and full of ideas”.
A pastor’s daughter who grew up in communist East Germany, Merkel is popular with Germans who see her as a straight shooter and a safe pair of hands. But Merkel said it was “grotesque and absurd” that a single person should be expected to carry the burden of leadership alone, in a nod to those who have described Merkel variously, following the election of President elect Trump, as the liberal West’s last defender.
But her decision to let in more than 1 million asylum seekers over the last two years revived the fortunes of the rightwing populist Alternative for Germany (AfD) party, which has harnessed widespread anxiety about migration. Listing her main challenges, Merkel said: “The European Union is currently under great strain, with the Euro crisis, with the refugee question, and following the decision of the United Kingdom to want to leave the EU, and with a situation in the world which, to put it delicately, needs to focus itself anew following the elections in America and also regarding the relationship to Russia.”
However, observers said the recent seismic shifts in global politics could drive traditionally risk-averse German voters back to her. “Society’s need for predictability and stability could become so overpowering in the 2017 election year that even the creeping erosion of Merkel’s chancellorship won’t compromise her success at the polls in the end,” the left-leaning news weekly Die Zeit said. Under the circumstances she said she felt ready to run again for the German chancellery, but added: “But I have said very clearly, all that which is connected to the (current situation in the world) especially after the elections in America, that I’m expected to deal with, it’s very grounding but I feel it very strongly as grotesque and downright absurd.
More than half of the electorate – 55% – want Merkel to stay in office, up from 42% in August, a poll for the newspaper Bild am Sonntag showed on Sunday. “No person, no person alone, even with a great deal of experience can face the things in Germany, in Europe, in the world ... certainly not a chancellor of Germany.”
Merkel had long refused to be drawn on her plans for the general election, expected in September or October 2017, saying only that she would make the announcement “at the appropriate time”. She said efforts to solve problems had to be made by countries’ leaders who recognised the common challenges and worked together to tackle them.
She repeated the line on Thursday at a bittersweet farewell news conference in Berlin with the outgoing US president, Barack Obama, who praised her as an “outstanding partner” and urged Germans to “appreciate” her. Despite the widespread expectation that Merkel would take the plunge, she told other leaders of her Christian Democrats (CDU) who met in Berlin on Sunday to prepare for their annual party conference in December: “I spent hours and hours wrestling with myself, but took the decision to stand again. The country and the CDU have given me a lot. I would like to give that back – even in what will not be an easy election campaign.”
“It’s up to her whether she wants to stand again … but if I were here and I were German and I had a vote, I might support her,” he said with a smile. She said she expected the election to be a tough one, due to the rise of the populist right in Germany, in the form of the Alternative für Deutschland (AfD), and at a time of great polarisation. She said she expected tough fight in the run-up to the election, but “a fight does not have to mean hate.” Her goal she said, was to “keep Germany together”.
Misgivings about Merkel’s refugee policy were blamed for a string of state election defeats for the CDU over the last year, and sparked an open revolt by its Bavarian sister party, the Christian Social Union (CSU), which demanded a strict upper limit on incoming asylum seekers. Merkel told party colleagues she had waited for the right moment before announcing her decision, which was widely interpreted as her desire to ensure her popularity ratings, that took a battering over her decision in the late summer of 2015 to allow around 900,000 migrants into Germany, had recovered sufficiently so she would have the backing of her party.
A poll on Sunday showed that Merkel’s conservatives would draw 33% of the vote if the election were held this weekend, down nine points from the last national election in 2013. German voters appear in favour of her standing again. A poll carried out by the Emnid institute for the tabloid Bild am Sonntag, showed that 55% of Germans supported her standing again, while 39% opposed it.
The centre-left Social Democrats (SPD), junior partners in Merkel’s ruling coalition, were a distant second with 24%. Merkel confirmed she was prepared to govern for a further full four-year term amid speculation she might aim to secure a win for her party but then bow out. She will be 67 by end of the next legislative period.
The AfD and the Greens were neck and neck with 13% and 12% respectively, according to the independent opinion research institute Emnid. Asked how she had come to her decision, and whether it was directly made in the light of the US election result, she said with a smile: “With me it’s the case that I need a long time and the decisions are made late. But then I stick to them.”
Barack Obama had said on Thursday during a visit to Berlin, that Merkel, a pastor’s daughter who grew up in communist East Germany, would face “big burdens” if she was to continue, but he said she was “outstanding” and “tough” and would get his support if he were German.
A poll last Thursday showed that Merkel’s CDU would secure 32% of the vote if the election was held now, with the Social Democrats on around 23% support, and the anti-immigrant Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) on 12% and on track to enter the Bundestag for the first time.