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DW-WORLD.DE
Bavarian Premier Stoiber Says He Will Step Down
(summary)
January 18, 2007
Following a major debate in his Christian Social Union party over his leadership, Bavarian Premier Edmund Stoiber has announced that he will step down in September.
The embattled leader of Bavaria's ruling party, Stoiber said he would step down as chairman of the Christian Social Union (CSU) and premier of the German state on Sept. 30.
Stoiber, a strategic ally of Chancellor Angela Merkel, has faced strong pressure to resign since opinion polls showed last weekend that support for the party has plummeted.
"My aim is to ensure that Bavaria remains the most successful state in Germany," he said, explaining his decision.
An attack dog in German politics, Stoiber often chipped away at
Berlin's authority over the country's 16 states. He also led the German center-right to overtly oppose Turkish entry into the "Christian" European Union.
Kurt Beck, the head of the Social Democratic Party, with which Merkel shares power, said having a lame duck premier in Bavaria would complicate national negotiations, though he said it would not affect cooperation within the ruling grand coalition.
"This could be good for Merkel," Oskar Niedermayer, a political scientist at Berlin's Free University, told Reuters. "Just about any successor to Stoiber would improve the relationship between the CDU and the CSU in the government and in parliament."
According to sources within the CSU, Bavarian Interior Minister Günther Beckstein would replace Stoiber as premier of the rich southern state Stoiber has headed since 1993.
Both German Agriculture Minister Horst Seehofer and the Bavarian Economy Minister Erwin Huber have express interest in becoming become head of the CSU, of which Stoiber has been leader since 1999.
Stoiber's announcement signals the potential end of a political career which very nearly hit the heights.
He was denied becoming German chancellor in 2002 by just a few thousand votes, losing ground to eventual winner Gerhard Schroder on issues such as the flooding in eastern Germany and the Iraq war.
However, despite never having the top job, Stoiber has enjoyed great status.
As premier of Bavaria , he has not only ruled one of Germany's most prosperous regions but has also wielded unique power on the national stage, running a party that is outside Merkel's control, enjoying the use of royal palaces, dominating every aspect of administration and basking in the acclaim of the mainly Catholic population.
However, with his career seemingly reeling from one blow too many, Stoiber faces leaving the podium for the last time with the words of the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung inscribed on his political tombstone: "Stoiber has shrunk from being a feared provincial ruler and politician of federal stature to a national joke: a toothless lion, a blunt guillotine."
The end of an era.
Skara Brae,
madkins