Only chance of being chancellor is in coalition with Greens and the FDP he accuses of 'welfare state massacre', writes DEREK SCALLYin Brandenburg
IN THE low-hanging afternoon sun, Frank-Walter Steinmeier squints into the modest crowd in the town square of Brandenburg, east of Berlin.
As people sip beer and discreetly check their watches, the mild-mannered challenger to Germany’s mild-mannered chancellor Angela Merkel delivers his campaign speech with his left hand in his trouser pocket.
The silver-haired Mr Steinmeier doesn’t do passion.
As Germany reels from the world economic crisis, this should be a golden hour for Germany’s Social Democrats (SPD).
The party has promised voters finance market rules to prevent another crisis, and to send the bill for the economic crisis to those who caused it. To do that, it needs another term in office.
“The thinking that caused the economic crisis cannot be the answer to the crisis,” bellows Mr Steinmeier in an attack on Dr Merkel’s plan to join forces after the election with the pro-business, liberal Free Democrats (FDP).
“Whoever wants a just society that isn’t torn into winners and losers has to keep the SPD strong.” After four years in the spotlight as foreign minister, Mr Steinmeier is still a backroom bureaucrat. He served as Gerhard Schröder’s chief of staff and his chancellor bid is also his first time running for public office.
When he praises “beautiful Brandenburg” it’s clear the SPD candidate hasn’t had time to walk around the town, 80km west of Berlin. Yes, there are renovated Jugendstil buildings, an impressive cathedral and the glittering Havel river.
But the streets of this former East German town are speckled with discount bakeries, temporary job agencies and “To Rent” signs. The 15 per cent jobless rate is almost visible in the air, like dust in sunlight.
One in two people here have been touched by unemployment over the last 20 years, over 80 per cent of people have had to reskill.
Many who could leave are gone, leaving behind retired fathers with bushy moustaches and younger, unemployed brothers with pumped-up bodies, sun-bed tans and plucked eyebrows. Their dull eyes only light up when Steinmeier promises them a statutory minimum wage.
“We need a new left government and I wish Steinmeier well, particularly on the wage issue,” says Klaus Frühklug, a lively pensioner. “There are people here working for €3.50 an hour, that can’t go on much longer.”
Middle-aged Gerd Stieg says he can imagine voting SPD after hearing Steinmeier even though, as an unemployed car parts dealer, he has less dole money in his pocket thanks to the SPD reforms of 2003.
“Steinmeier’s not Schröder, Schröder was too right-wing,” he says. “I think the SPD has learned their lesson and corrected the worst of the reforms. They deserve another chance.”
There is one great unspoken in Mr Steinmeier’s campaign: his only realistic chance of leading Germany’s next government is in a three-way coalition with the Greens and the same FDP he accuses of “welfare state massacre”.
Yesterday the FDP dismissed that idea, saying a Steinmeier-lead government would “only lead to more burdens on taxpayers”.
So does Mr Steinmeier really want to become chancellor? These days he leaves others to express that ambition, prompting speculation that his goal is to return the SPD to power in a second grand coalition.
“That would devastate the party, because it would only be putting off for another four years the renewal it badly needs now,” says Prof Henrick Enderlein of Berlin’s Hertie School of Governance. “What the SPD needs is at least two terms in opposition for it to recover its identity and restock its depleted ranks.”
Since finishing the 2005 election in second place, the party has changed its leader four times and its political direction twice.
First came an ill-fated swing to the left to take on the challenge posed by the new Left Party. When that failed to revive its fortunes, Mr Steinmeier and other Schröder loyalists heaved the SPD back to the political centre, only to find its former home occupied by Chancellor Merkel’s Christian Democrats (CDU).
The SPD can no longer count on Gerhard Schröder either.
The two-term chancellor has been kept out of sight for fear of reviving memories of the unpopular welfare reforms that ended his second term in 2005.
By distancing themselves from their reforms, Mr Steinmeier and the SPD can’t take credit for the positive effects, such as a four-point drop in the jobless rate to 7 per cent.
At 25 per cent in polls, 12 points behind the CDU, Mr Steinmeier’s thankless task in the final days of campaigning is to try and lift his party to 29 per cent.
If he fails, he will be remembered as the man who delivered the worst election result in the SPD’s 125-year history.