2024-09-21 22:42:07
The Union has decided the K question earlier than expected. Was that planned from the beginning? Or did one person push the others? And if so, who?
Friedrich Merz is beaming from ear to ear. The man who usually likes to rush from A to B is deliberately walking slowly today. As if he wanted to enjoy every second of this moment. Behind the CSU chairman Markus Söder, the CDU leader strides up the stage, takes his place at the podium – and grins.
Söder, meanwhile, is tearing the band-aid off: “To put it briefly. The K question has been decided. Friedrich Merz will do it.” The CSU leader promised that 2021 would not be repeated. And he is keeping his word. The common goal of replacing the traffic light coalition is paramount. Everything must be subordinated to that. Also, and this is important for Söder to say, if both are suitable as candidates for chancellor, Merz has first right of access.
Video | Söder gives up “without gnashing of teeth”: Merz becomes the Union’s candidate for chancellor
He thanks Söder three times when it’s his turn. Handshakes, back pats, we managed that well. The two party leaders do their best to appear harmonious. But none of the journalists present should ask about what happened over the past few days. Immediately after their statements, the two rush off the stage.
Until recently, almost no one in the Union really knew anything about it. Only the closest circles of the two party leaders Söder and Merz were informed when the invitation to a joint press conference was sent out on Tuesday morning. The plan that the others knew: the decision will be made now and announced later.
Merz had only informed the state leaders of his ambitions last weekend. As t-online learned from party circles, the CDU leader called one after the other. He would be seeking the candidacy for chancellor and had been in contact with Söder for weeks. The two also wanted to meet in the coming week, i.e. the current week, to prepare everything. Then on Monday, September 22nd, i.e. after the Brandenburg election, the two party leaders were to propose Merz as a candidate to their committees.
That was the plan. Until yesterday. Because since Monday the narrative seems to have gotten mixed up. First North Rhine-Westphalia’s Prime Minister Hendrik Wüst announced that he was not available. Then on Tuesday morning the CSU invited everyone to a joint statement with Merz. Both came suddenly, and both initially left the question open: Did everything really go according to plan here?
It is Monday afternoon when Hendrik Wüst takes his fortunes into his own hands. The CDU North Rhine-Westphalia invites the chairman to a press statement. The reason, according to CDU circles, is a personal statement and a look ahead to the upcoming federal election. There is a brief moment of excitement: is Wüst now declaring his candidacy? But the answer is actually clear to everyone: of course not. Because Wüst was never really up for discussion.
Nevertheless, Wüst makes the press wait almost eight minutes before he finally gets to the crucial point in his statement, namely “that I am currently and under the given circumstances not available for the Union’s candidacy for chancellor in the 2025 federal election.” And: “At the same time, I have asked the state executive committee to support our federal chairman Friedrich Merz as candidate for chancellor.”
It is the decisive message regarding the K question. Suddenly it seems to the public as if Wüst had decided a case – and as if Merz was the candidate by his grace instead of Söder.
A strategic move that makes Wüst look good in public, but which is not well received by everyone. Especially not in Bavaria. There should actually be agreement. But that doesn’t matter now. Söder sent the parliamentary group leader Klaus Holetschek ahead on Monday. At the CSU parliamentary group meeting in Banz Monastery, Holetschek told the “Bild” newspaper: “Actually, a different procedure was agreed between the party leaders, and that’s why I find this surprising at this point.” Wüst must “know himself what he is communicating.” “It was a good procedure, and they should have stuck to it.”