GERMAN CHANCELLOR Angela Merkel is facing a bumpy road ahead after the opposition Social Democrats (SPD) agreed yesterday to form a minority coalition in the western state of North Rhine Westphalia (NRW).
The announcement will cost Dr Merkel crucial votes in the upper house of parliament, the Bundesrat, a month after her Christian Democrats (CDU) polled a disastrous election result in the state.
The party finished the election neck and neck with the opposition SPD, with neither side garnering enough seats to rule with its traditional partner.
SPD leader Hannelore Kraft tried in vain to form a three-way coalition with the Greens and the liberal Free Democrats (FDP).
She then rejected as politically unpalatable an offer as junior partner in a grand coalition with the CDU, which finished 8,000 votes ahead.
Finally Ms Kraft ruled out a three-way alliance with the Greens and the Left Party, made up of reformed communists and disgruntled former SPD members.
Just one parliamentary vote short of a majority, Ms Kraft will be reliant on support from the Left or elsewhere to govern – but she said she is unwilling to be tied into a formal coalition. Analysts suggested instead that the SPD leader would introduce a programme of key campaign reforms, in education and elsewhere, before calling a fresh election within a year.
The outcome is a sizeable setback for Dr Merkel for a host of reasons. Outgoing NRW state governor Jürgen Rüttgers ended four decades of unbroken SPD rule in its political homeland in 2005.
With his departure, Dr Merkel loses a CDU heavyweight figure who appealed to centrist voters.
It is the third potential loss for the party in a month: leading CDU conservative Roland Koch, governor in neighbouring Hesse, has already thrown in the towel, while close ally Christian Wulff, governor in Lower Saxony, is running for president.
With the SPD back in power in NRW, Dr Merkel can no longer count on the state’s crucial votes in the June 30th presidential poll.
Even if she scrapes together enough votes to elect Mr Wulff, losing control of NRW is almost certain to cause political strife further down the road.
Anticipating that, even before the NRW deal, Dr Merkel’s officials began drafting legislation for the government’s €80 billion austerity package to bypass an upper-house vote. Dr Merkel though cannot avoid the Bundesrat for ever: a showdown is likely in the autumn when both houses of parliament will vote on controversial government plans to extend the life of the country’s nuclear plants.
The Left Party vowed to support the SPD-led minority coalition yesterday if it brought about “real political change” but co-leader Gesine Lötzsch suggested a stable coalition arrangement was desirable. That is unlikely for now: NRW’s Left Party is considered one of the most far left in the country, with links to groups under state surveillance.
