Early poll looms for Germany after shock loss

The state election loss in North Rhine-Westphalia is a shattering vote of no confidence in Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder. Picture / Reuters

BERLIN - Gerhard Schroeder's ruling Social Democrats have announced surprise plans to bring forward Germany's general election by a year to this northern autumn.

The move follows the SPD's shattering defeat by conservatives in the former left-wing stronghold of North Rhine-Westphalia.

The vote in the country's most populous state was seen as the last and most important test of Schroeder's popularity before Germany's full general election, originally scheduled for autumn 2006.

Yet it resulted in a dramatic, if predicted, victory for the conservative Christian Democrats (CDU), who ended 39 years of unbroken rule by Social Democrats in the state and upped their share of the vote by 8 per cent.

The Social Democrats' dismal performance - their worst for 50 years in North Rhine-Westphalia - prompted Franz Muntefering, the party's general secretary, to take the almost unprecedented step of calling for the general election to be brought forward by a year.

A final decision on would be subject to a vote by the entire Parliament.

Angela Merkel, the CDU's 46-year-old leader who described her party's victory as a "sensational success", said she favoured an early election. "Every day without the Social Democrats and Greens in power is a good day for Germany."

The CDU was expected to decide within weeks, if not days, on their candidate to challenge Schroeder for the chancellorship. The frontrunner remains Merkel, who would become the first woman in Germany to run for the post.

The vote brought humiliating defeat for North Rhine-Westphalia's "red-green coalition" of Social Democrats and Greens and put the CDU firmly on course to form a new coalition in the state.

More significantly, the outcome was also a crushing vote of no confidence in Schroeder, who was first elected to power seven years ago on a mandate to reform Germany's ailing economy and reduce the deepening unemployment problem.

CDU officials insisted yesterday that their victory in North Rhine-Westphalia, a state larger than Belgium in terms of population, had put them firmly on course for victory in the next general election.

"The result may herald the beginning of the end of the Government in Berlin because 12 of Germany's 16 federal states will be ruled by conservatives," said Richard Kessler, a political commentator. "Mr Schroeder will have hardly any room to manoeuvre."

Veteran observers of the German left warned earlier that the outcome could also lead to a spate of bitter infighting within the ruling SPD which might prompt Schroeder's early resignation as Chancellor. "The SPD may trip itself up. If the Chancellor's reputation is damaged in the process, nobody should be surprised if he throws in the towel," said Peter Glotz, a leading SPD strategist.

Schroeder's failure to reduce Germany's five million unemployed, despite a battery of social and economic reforms, was seen as the main reason for the Social Democrats' demise in North Rhine-Westphalia - a state regarded for nearly four decades as an impregnable stronghold of the left.

The state has over one million unemployed and a jobless rate of over 15 per cent - well above the national 10 per cent average. More than 12,000 companies have gone bankrupt in the region, once considered Germany's economic powerhouse.

- INDEPENDENT