Germany's SPD, the main opposition party, has picked Peer Steinbrueck, a former finance minister who worked under Chancellor Angela Merkel on coalition and who broadly agrees with her policies, to challenge her at next year's general election. While the formal selection has still to take place, Steinbrueck's nomination as Social Democratic standard-bearer is certain, with his only two potential rivals inside the party endorsing him Friday.
Merkel's Christian Democrats meanwhile have a commanding lead in the polls. The Social Democrats, who are pinning their hopes on forming a coalition with the opposition Greens to rule, are trailing by a 6 percentage points. An Insa poll published by Bild newspaper this week gave Merkel's CDU/CSU party 36-per-cent support, while the Social Democrats would win 30 and the Greens 14 per cent if an election were held now.
That suggests it is still most likely to be Merkel's party who emerge the largest on polling day and Merkel who will be charged with forming a coalition after the election, which is likely to be take place in September 2013. Steinbrueck served as German finance minister 2005-09 when Merkel led a so-called "Grand Coalition" with the Social Democrats, a pairing of the two historic largest parties in Germany.
That alliance was coolly professional, without any signs of affection. On the rare occasions when Merkel and Steinbrueck made joint public announcements, their rivalry was tangible, with both seeming to compete for the microphone and the buttoned-down Merkel showing her frostiest side. For his part, Steinbrueck has regularly questioned Merkel's capability in sarcastic speeches in parliament.
Despite their scathing words for one another, the political differences between Merkel, 58, and Steinbrueck, 65, are actually slight. Both are committed to the same brand of economic reforms that Germany has preached in recent years to its eurozone neighbours: less welfare and balanced budgets. But Steinbrueck demands more regulation of financial markets than Merkel supporters are comfortable with.
The Social Democrat broadly backs Merkel's carrot-and-stick policy of only bailing out eurozone countries that submit to German-style discipline, but favours bolder moves to wind back the debt that is hobbling the sticken southern nations of the eurozone. He has successfully opposed efforts within his own party to undo highly-unpopular reforms cutting Germany's previously generous welfare for the unemployed - introduced by the Social Democrats' last chancellor, Gerhard Schroeder.
Next year's election campaign would be a battle of personalities rather than policies, Gero Neugebauer, a political scientist at the Free University of Berlin, suggested, with the Social Democrats presenting themselves as the more capable party. "They have to mount a campaign which persuades Germans that they too have the competence to solve the problems," he told dpa. Steinbrueck, who has backed bailouts while urging much sharper regulation of banks, is the figure who conveyed this message best.
"They have to stay in the middle of the road, so someone like Steinbrueck is the logical candidate," said Neugebauer. Steinbrueck is the Social Democrat who is most likely to poach away potential CDU voters, Merkel supporters concede off the record. Conversely he is disliked among left-wingers and environmentalists who form a significant strata of the German political classes. Volker Kronenberg, a University of Bonn political scientist, said the leftist section of the SPD would feel "uncomfortable" with him. Indeed, the small Left Party welcomed the selection, saying it expected to pick up left-leaning voters alienated by Steinbrueck.
He also has a record of friction with the Green Party after leading an uncomfortable coalition with them while leading the state coalition government in the populous North Rhine Westphalia in 2002-05. Kronenberg said the candidate's abrasive style and stated refusal to re-enter a Merkel government as her junior would impress voters. "He's entering the fray under the banner of 'all-or-nothing'," he told dpa. Analysts also warned taht this year's election in France of a Socialist president, Francois Hollande, with explicitly pro-labour policies was not a portent for Germany, which has a broadly centrist electorate with only small left and right fringes.
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