But where is Friedrich Merz going? The Germans ardently ask themselves the question since the possible future German Chancellor has broken the health cord on January 29 by bringing a resolution on migration policy with the help of the far -right AFD party (alternative for Germany). “I do not look at the left or right. I look in front of me,” he justified to explain his turnaround.
Never in the history of post-war German parliamentarism, a democratic party has knowingly accepted the support of the far right, the same day when the Federal Assembly (Bundestag) paid tribute to the victims of Nazism in the hemicycle. Following this political earthquake, several Holocaust survivors decided to make their decorations.
Why now? Three weeks from the elections? While he had promised to respect the “democratic consensus”, Friedrich Merz changed his rifle to slow down the erosion of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) in the polls. “A very risky poker stroke,” said Ursula Münch, director of the Tutzing Political Science Academy.
Especially since the maneuver has not served him for the moment. On the contrary, it allowed AFD to live, on January 29, a real triumph in the Assembly. “You copied our program,” said Alice Weidel, the president of AFD, who has always wished a government of the right to the right. “The so-called health cord, which is nothing other than an anti-democratic cartel aimed at neutralizing the will of the voters, is dead,” she added.
Merz isolated
Risky, indeed. Merz already seems isolated in his attempted populist turn. The Christian churches, but also great entrepreneurs, like the big boss of Infineon Jochen Hanebeck, condemned his rapprochement with the extreme right. Hermetic border control, forfeiture of nationality, retention of expelles and strengthening the powers of the police … The Merz program now resembles that of the extreme right. “He is in line with Giorgia Meloni in Italy and Viktor Orbán in Hungary”, regrets Frank Baasner, co-director of the forum for the Franco-German future. “He is taking Trump a bit right now,” he adds.
Merz is however deeply European, as confirmed by his speech as a foreign policy at the Körber Foundation in Berlin on January 23. “There is a huge gap between its convictions on Europe and its positions on immigration,” continues Frank Baasner, who wants to be reassuring about the future: “We are in the middle of the electoral campaign”, Tempere-T -he.
Anti-merz
This January 29 will nevertheless have consequences for the political game in Germany. With scores above 30 % in the eastern regions of the country, AFD has become the first parliamentary force in the territories of the old GDR. The regional federations of the CDU will now wonder why they should continue to ally with a pro-Puttine Left Party (that of Sahra Wagenknecht) to train minority alliances, all in the name of the health cord, while the Conservatives are much closer to the extreme right ideas.
By sending this message (“Unite to AFD!”), Merz tries to definitively turn the page of “Angela Merkel’s” reception culture “and return to the basics of the 1990s.” A l ‘ Early, the conservatives were even more radical than the AFD in terms of immigration. Merz wants to create a break with Merkel, which is seen as the cause of all problems. “Without it, AFD probably would have many voters today,” said Ursula Münch.
Angela Merkel, who had ousted Merz in 2002 from the benches of the Assembly, came out of her silence by publishing a Missive Assassin where she denounces a “tactic maneuver”. The former chancellor had nevertheless promised to silence in the countryside. “She decided to take the head of an anti-merz sling,” notes Markus Linden, political scientist at the University of Trier, before adding: “It is not nothing. Her political weight is still important”.
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