“Comeback” of the Chancellor
Merkel is back on the political stage
By Franca Lehfeldt
02/11/2022, 7:08 p.m
She takes part in the Federal Assembly, but not in the celebratory dinner afterwards. Despite this half-way cancellation, the excitement in the CDU is great: On Sunday, former Chancellor Merkel will return to the political soil of the capital.
“She’s coming!” It says from the ranks of the CDU in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania. Her home association has nominated the former chancellor as a delegate to the Federal Assembly and is proud of her own decision. “It should therefore be clear who nominated the most photographed and most watched voter,” explains a CDU state politician.
Angela Merkel had withdrawn from the public eye since handing over office to her successor. Voices from her environment said behind closed doors that Merkel wanted to keep a low profile for six months. It’s not six months with the forthcoming public appearance on Sunday, that makes your national association forgiving. After Merkel stayed away from the digital federal party conference of the CDU, did not allow herself to be elected honorary chairperson and did not accept the invitation of the new chairperson Friedrich Merz to dinner on the evening of the party conference, she also shone by being absent from the state party conference of her party in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania.
“She would have liked to have been able to take part in the first party congress after her term in office, but many didn’t like that. After all, she was elected here for decades, a farewell and a few personal words of thanks would have been appropriate,” says a CDU representative Northeast CDU.
But yesterday’s anger has been forgotten, on Sunday the chancellor will take part in the federal assembly. In the Paul-Löbe-Haus of the German Bundestag, rows of chairs and a lectern have already been arranged. However, the corona-compliant arrangement of place cards and distances has more the visual appeal of a vaccination center than an act of state. “We even got her a seat in the front row,” explains a group member. It remains to be seen whether the seat in the first row had to be specially reserved for the former chancellor or whether it is a matter of course. The excitement and a certain pride are unmistakable. Merkel is now removed from day-to-day politics, the historical appraisal covers conflicts of content in detail, the former chancellor now embodies history.
With Merz in the front row
Due to the pandemic, the festivities surrounding the election of the Federal President have been greatly reduced, here and there in the capital there are small gatherings in the state representations or restaurants. In the home country of the former chancellor, the social democrat Manuela Schwesig governs with the left, so the state representation of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania is not the natural haven for the small group of the CDU-MV, although the state secretary of the state representation has issued an invitation.
After the Federal Assembly, the group will meet in a restaurant in the immediate vicinity of the Reichstag and let the evening fade away. If the chancellor was dismissed together at a dinner in the Parliamentary Society last year, Angela Merkel will not be joining the group on Sunday evening. “She doesn’t come with me to eat, but we didn’t really assume that,” it says.
After all, it could be deduced from this decision that the former chancellor’s rejection of Friedrich Merz a few weeks ago was not personal, but a certain distance from the political establishment. You don’t have to guess where Angela Merkel will make her cross on Sunday afternoon, the Union leadership says that Merkel had the message transmitted, regardless of whether and who the Union would put up as its own candidate, that she would choose Frank-Walter Steinmeier. It will be exciting to see how the first meeting of the former chancellor and the current party leader Merz goes. Both sit prominently at the front of the Federal Assembly.