Germany’s “inflexible” constitution means beleaguered Chancellor Olaf Scholz will keep his job regardless of the fact that his coalition government is “without doubt the least popular in the Republic‘s history”, a German former MEP and business leader has said.
Hans-Olaf Henkel believes Berlin has been reduced to “lecturing” other nations about what they should do while simultaneously failing to spend enough on defence, “embracing” Vladimir Putin and still worryingly dependent on Russian oil and gas.
Mr Scholz – who succeeded long-serving predecessor Angela Merkel in 2021 -yesterday took a helicopter flight to check flooded regions in the northwest of the country after heavy rainfall. Earlier he used his New Year’s speech to call on his country’s citizens not to lose confidence in the future, acknowledging widespread “discontent” and admitting: “I do take that to heart.”
But with a survey published by UBS last week suggesting the UK’s economy will outstrip that of Germany over the course of the next three years, most polls put Mr Scholz’s SPD party on about 15 percent, ten points down on its showing in the 2021 federal elections and roughly the same as coalition partners the Greens. The Free Democrats, the coalition’s third partner, is currently polling below the five percent required to sit in the Bundestag.
Mr Henkel, the former President of the Federation of German Industries (BDI), who stood down from the European Parliament in 2019, acknowledged that such numbers would pose a serious risk to the political careers of many world leaders.
He told Express.co.uk: “Both dictators and democratically elected leaders fear the wrath of voters.
“The Putins, Erdogans and Maduros of the world have many instruments to make sure they stay in power: suppress the media, put their friends into the judicial system, manipulate elections.
“If this isn‘t enough they eliminate the opposition by putting them into prison or letting them be killed by their secret service organisation.
“Democratically elected leaders don’t have these tools (though some of them can’t resist trying some of them out anyway as in the cases of Donald Trump, Viktor Orban or Jaroslaw Kaczynski). They are restricted by their constitutions – either in written form, as in the case of Germany, or the form of historical practice, like in Britain.”
If a British Prime Minister believed he or she was sufficiently popular, he had the option of calling a snap election, Mr Henkel pointed out – but equally, they could be replaced by their own party, as has happened with the Tories three times since 2019.
Mr Henkel continued: “A German Chancellor does neither have a similar risk to be ousted nor the flexibility to extend his/her reign by calling snap elections like the counterpart in Britain.
“After WW2 only one Chancellor unwillingly lost his job.
“Olaf Scholz leads beyond doubt the least popular coalition Government in the Republic’s history. But he can stay in the saddle regardless of how much the horse he rides is kicking.”
Post-war politics in his country was characterised by stability, and while the UK has had 17 Prime Ministers in that period and Italy 31, Germany has had just nine, Mr Henkel pointed out.
However, he added: “This stability comes at a high price: immobility, rigidity and inflexibility. Olaf Scholz‘s Government, consisting of a coalition between Socialists, Greens and Liberals produces more than any other German Government laws that are compromises which don’t satisfy either their parties’ membership nor do they make the voters happy. No wonder that currently only one-third of Germans would still vote for it.
“The reason why Scholz can still sleep well lies in the German constitution written under the Allies‘ supervision in 1948. They wanted to make sure that Germany would never again become an unstable threat to the world.
“Together with the collective guilt complex (Germany tries to be more peaceful, more generous and more environmentally friendly than any other nation) it does not only result in stability, it results in Germany permanently lecturing others about what to do and what not.”
Consequently, Germany phased out nuclear energy, while others – for example, France and the UK – committed to continuing using it “absorbed millions of refugees, “ruined” its army, and for years “failed to meet the target for defence spending of two percent of GDP, Mr Henkel said.
He concluded: “Germany embraced Putin even after he attacked Moldavia, Georgia, Crimea, and the whole of Ukraine.
“Germany damaged its industries by becoming dependent on Russia gas and oil. I know nobody more typical for his country than Olaf Scholz.”
During his speech, Mr Scholz added: “My fellow citizens, our strength also resides in the realisation that each and every one of us is needed in our country – the top researcher just like the carer, the police officer just like the delivery driver, the pensioner just like the young trainee.
“If we get that into our heads, if we deal with one another in that spirit of respect, then we need have no fear about the future.
“Then the year 2024 will be a good year for our country, even if some things do turn out differently from the way we imagine them today, on the eve of that new year.”
