The repercussions of this election remain to be seen, but this is not good for the future of the EU's perpetual bailout hopes if Germany is revolting already. This, combined with Ireland's attempts to force senior bondholder haircuts may end up being the Tunisia of the EU: the catalyst that ignites region wide revolt.
Angela Merkel faces a painful setback in the Baden-Württemberg elections
The CDU's hold on the state may give way to a Green-SPD coalition after the chancellor's U-turn on nuclear power
Baden-Württemberg in south-west Germany is one of Europe's richest regions. For almost 58 years, it has been governed by Angela Merkel's conservative Christian Democratic Union (CDU).
But from 6pm tonight, when the first results from the state's elections start to come in, this region of plenty might well be heading into the clutches of the opposition. If the pollsters are correct, the risk-averse burghers of Baden-Württemberg – with their locally assembled Mercedes in their garages and their jobs for life – may end up electing, by a narrow vote, Germany's first Green regional prime minister. Even more shocking is the slim chance that the ultra-socialist Linke (Left) party might win enough votes to be represented in the state parliament. The election might be a local one, but the consequences will reverberate in Berlin.
"If the CDU loses, it will be a massive blow for Merkel," said the Social Democrat candidate Nils Schmidt, 37, whose party may end up ruling Baden-Württemberg in a coalition with the Greens. "But remember she is Teflon Angie. Will it stop her staying on as chancellor until the next general election in 2013? She doesn't have any competition in her own party any more."
On Tuesday evening, the CDU's Stefan Mappus did his best to seem upbeat. The incumbent state prime minister, a squat 45-year-old, took to the podium at the Sillenbuch retirement community in Stuttgart and told the crowd what they wanted to hear. "We in Baden-Württemberg are the best and we want to keep it that way," he said. "We have the lowest unemployment – just 4.3% – and our economy is growing by 5.5%."
But Mappus was in trouble and he knew it. Just 50km up the road from Sillenbuch, in the village of Neckarwestheim, was one obvious cause of his – and Merkel's – nosedive in the polls. Surrounded by vineyards and potato fields are two nuclear power stations, Neckarwestheim I and II. Thirteen days ago, Merkel announced that one of them would be immediately taken off the grid, along with six other nuclear plants built before 1980. The decision, taken after the explosions at the Fukushima reactors in Japan, was a brazen U-turn in CDU policy and a naked attempt to shore up votes – 70% of Germans saw it as such, and their suspicions were confirmed on Thursday with a leak of comments made by Merkel's economics and technology minister, Rainer Brüderle, who told a group of businessmen that the chancellor's decisions in the run-up to the Baden-Württemberg elections were "not always rational".
Perhaps more painful for Merkel were comments by the veteran CDU chancellor Helmut Kohl, who wrote a piece in the tabloid Bild on Friday criticising her "overly hasty" decision. Retreating from nuclear energy would "not help anyone", said the 80-year-old, and would "even make the world a more dangerous place" because Germany's respected engineering know-how would no longer be used to improve the industry.
In the bakery in Neckarwestheim, Karl-Georg Weber, 68, agreed. "It was a panic reaction," he said. "Merkel is a physicist, she should know better than to take these short-term decisions." Weber worked in the local nuclear power plants for 36 years. "I was there in the 70s helping to build the first one," he said. "I have nothing against them."
But he is unusual. Some 64% of Germans are not in favour of nuclear power, according to the latest poll from the N-TV news channel, which is why the Baden-Württemberg Green party finds itself facing the unexpected prospect that its candidate, a former chemistry teacher called Winfried Kretschmann, could become state prime minister.
Even before Fukushima blew, Germany was a vehemently anti-nuclear country, which is why Merkel's defiant decision last year to renew the life of 17 ageing nuclear reactors in the face of protests was controversial. Why Germans are so opposed to the nuclear industry while their French neighbours take it for granted is a matter for debate. Weber thinks it is ingrained in the national psyche: "Germans are scared of anything and everything. We're scared of getting cancer. We're scared of there being too much salt in our Bretzels. We're scared of buying the wrong sort of eggs. It's a mentality thing."
But nuclear power is not Merkel's only battleground. She is fighting on other fronts – her unpopular decision to participate in the EU bailout of Greece and other countries, and the decision to abstain from the UN resolution on the no-fly zone in Libya.
For some, today's election is "the beginning of the end" for Merkel. Jakob Augstein, a German commentator and publisher, wrote last week on Spiegel Online that if the CDU is ousted in the "conservative heartland" of Baden-Württemberg, her position will be untenable.
"If the CDU is threatened with defeat here, then bad mistakes have been made. Merkel has made mistakes. And in her attempt to rectify the consequences, she has made even more," he said. "She has lost her political intuition."
But from 6pm tonight, when the first results from the state's elections start to come in, this region of plenty might well be heading into the clutches of the opposition. If the pollsters are correct, the risk-averse burghers of Baden-Württemberg – with their locally assembled Mercedes in their garages and their jobs for life – may end up electing, by a narrow vote, Germany's first Green regional prime minister. Even more shocking is the slim chance that the ultra-socialist Linke (Left) party might win enough votes to be represented in the state parliament. The election might be a local one, but the consequences will reverberate in Berlin.
"If the CDU loses, it will be a massive blow for Merkel," said the Social Democrat candidate Nils Schmidt, 37, whose party may end up ruling Baden-Württemberg in a coalition with the Greens. "But remember she is Teflon Angie. Will it stop her staying on as chancellor until the next general election in 2013? She doesn't have any competition in her own party any more."
On Tuesday evening, the CDU's Stefan Mappus did his best to seem upbeat. The incumbent state prime minister, a squat 45-year-old, took to the podium at the Sillenbuch retirement community in Stuttgart and told the crowd what they wanted to hear. "We in Baden-Württemberg are the best and we want to keep it that way," he said. "We have the lowest unemployment – just 4.3% – and our economy is growing by 5.5%."
But Mappus was in trouble and he knew it. Just 50km up the road from Sillenbuch, in the village of Neckarwestheim, was one obvious cause of his – and Merkel's – nosedive in the polls. Surrounded by vineyards and potato fields are two nuclear power stations, Neckarwestheim I and II. Thirteen days ago, Merkel announced that one of them would be immediately taken off the grid, along with six other nuclear plants built before 1980. The decision, taken after the explosions at the Fukushima reactors in Japan, was a brazen U-turn in CDU policy and a naked attempt to shore up votes – 70% of Germans saw it as such, and their suspicions were confirmed on Thursday with a leak of comments made by Merkel's economics and technology minister, Rainer Brüderle, who told a group of businessmen that the chancellor's decisions in the run-up to the Baden-Württemberg elections were "not always rational".
Perhaps more painful for Merkel were comments by the veteran CDU chancellor Helmut Kohl, who wrote a piece in the tabloid Bild on Friday criticising her "overly hasty" decision. Retreating from nuclear energy would "not help anyone", said the 80-year-old, and would "even make the world a more dangerous place" because Germany's respected engineering know-how would no longer be used to improve the industry.
In the bakery in Neckarwestheim, Karl-Georg Weber, 68, agreed. "It was a panic reaction," he said. "Merkel is a physicist, she should know better than to take these short-term decisions." Weber worked in the local nuclear power plants for 36 years. "I was there in the 70s helping to build the first one," he said. "I have nothing against them."
But he is unusual. Some 64% of Germans are not in favour of nuclear power, according to the latest poll from the N-TV news channel, which is why the Baden-Württemberg Green party finds itself facing the unexpected prospect that its candidate, a former chemistry teacher called Winfried Kretschmann, could become state prime minister.
Even before Fukushima blew, Germany was a vehemently anti-nuclear country, which is why Merkel's defiant decision last year to renew the life of 17 ageing nuclear reactors in the face of protests was controversial. Why Germans are so opposed to the nuclear industry while their French neighbours take it for granted is a matter for debate. Weber thinks it is ingrained in the national psyche: "Germans are scared of anything and everything. We're scared of getting cancer. We're scared of there being too much salt in our Bretzels. We're scared of buying the wrong sort of eggs. It's a mentality thing."
But nuclear power is not Merkel's only battleground. She is fighting on other fronts – her unpopular decision to participate in the EU bailout of Greece and other countries, and the decision to abstain from the UN resolution on the no-fly zone in Libya.
For some, today's election is "the beginning of the end" for Merkel. Jakob Augstein, a German commentator and publisher, wrote last week on Spiegel Online that if the CDU is ousted in the "conservative heartland" of Baden-Württemberg, her position will be untenable.
"If the CDU is threatened with defeat here, then bad mistakes have been made. Merkel has made mistakes. And in her attempt to rectify the consequences, she has made even more," he said. "She has lost her political intuition."
