GERMANY: Christian Democrat (CDU) leader Angela Merkel is at least a month away from the chancellery, but leading allies have already started to undermine her.
Edmund Stoiber, the Bavarian state premier and future economics minister, said Dr Merkel would lack the power normally bestowed on a chancellor because of the political reality of the grand coalition between CDU and Social Democrats (SPD).
"At the end of the day, it can be that the chancellor will indicate the direction but that this is only possible in limited doses," said Mr Stoiber yesterday.
His close ally Michael Glos, the Christian Social Union (CSU) parliamentary leader, said that Dr Merkel would have to learn the difference between her "constitutional" authority and the "constitutional reality" authority of the grand coalition.
Dr Merkel will have a job to build trust with the Social Democrats after a bitter election campaign and three post-election weeks of political posturing.
SPD leader Franz Müntefering warned the future CDU chancellor against using her authority in that office to force through decisions.
"Whoever does that in a coalition knows that the coalition is over," he said, the clearest indicator yet that the SPD will not let itself be treated as a junior partner in the grand coalition.
The coalition talks begin on Monday and will last a month, but the tone in Berlin yesterday does not bode well for the government's life-span or its acceptance among backbenchers.
"We've let ourselves be led around by the nose and treated like monkeys," said one SPD backbencher. "If necessary, we will tell our talks leaders, 'You haven't done a good job' and reject" a coalition deal.
"In this situation you'd wish a grand coalition headed by a King Solomon," commented the Süddeutsche Zeitung, "but it's just Angela Merkel standing there, about whose political substance nobody really knows much."
The rival parties will begin talks on Monday and hope to finalise the shape of a new government by November 12th.
The CDU finished last month's general election just four parliamentary seats ahead of the SPD. Chancellor Gerhard Schröder refused to stand down, saying that, although his government had been voted out, the CDU had not received a mandate to govern with its preferred coalition partner, the Free Democrats.