Katja Hoyer Katja Hoyer

Why Merkel’s party is backing a political lightweight to replace her

Angela Merkel and Armin Laschet (Getty images)

The run-up to the German federal elections in September was supposed to be dull and predictable. Merkel would name a successor and the German public would grudgingly vote for the chosen one as there was nowhere else to go. If this predictable drudge meant disaffecting voters further and losing another couple of percentage points here or there, so be it. The German conservatives would still come out as the strongest party and select its partners for a coalition, just as Merkel has done for the last four terms in office.

But things have changed. The gravity of Merkel’s own personality was what held many votes tied to a party that has been haemorrhaging support for a long time. After sixteen years of continuity, the dynamism in Merkel’s CDU has gone, they have run out of fresh ideas. The chancellor’s tight reign over her inner circle of power has made sure of that. The fact of the matter is that when you remove Merkel from the centre of her party’s orbit, what remains is a collection of yes-men circling around a big black hole in the middle.

The man the CDU has put forward to fill this Merkel-shaped hole is Armin Laschet. He has neither the personality, nor the political gravity to fill it. A career politician with a monotonous voice and professional look, he personifies the blandness and lack of ideas that Germans are beginning to resent. There is a palpable desire for freshness, creativity and renewal after four terms of Merkelism, and after Covid. A continuity candidate like Laschet is not going to cut it.

And yet, the CDU leadership have this afternoon announced they will support Laschet’s bid to stand as their candidate for chancellor in the upcoming federal election. Recent polls have shown this might well be political suicide for the party.

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