Backlash Over Bailout May Sway German Vote

[Cees Binkhorst]

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Ben benieuwd of Mw. Merkel de meerderheid houdt.

Groet / Cees

Backlash Over Bailout May Sway German Vote
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/08/world/europe/08germany.html
Gordon Welters for The New York Times

An campaign poster featuring Oskar Lafontaine, the leader of The Left
Party, in front of city hall in Bochum, Germany, on Thursday.
By NICHOLAS KULISH
Published: May 7, 2010

BOCHUM, Germany — Germans have found themselves cast as the stingy
villains in the financial drama over Greece. But in the struggling
industrial cities in western Germany voting in state elections on
Sunday, they see themselves as victims of endless demands inside and
outside the country for dwindling resources.

Many beleaguered former West Germans, the stalwarts of European
integration before the country’s reunification, are increasingly asking
what is in it for them. The repercussions for Europe and the stability
of financial markets worldwide could be enormous.

Voters in the Ruhr rust-belt region of North Rhine-Westphalia will have
the chance this weekend to vent their frustration at Chancellor Angela
Merkel for pushing the bailout package through Parliament on Friday.
Even before the drama in Athens, the fatigue was evident from helping to
shoulder the financial burden of rebuilding eastern Germany, as the
heavy industry they depended on for their livelihood bled away.

Germany’s nearly $30 billion share of the bailout deal for Greece — and
with it the fear that other countries on the periphery of the euro zone
like Portugal and Spain won’t be far behind — comes after the country
spent an estimated $2 trillion to build up the former East Germany since
the historic fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989.

“It’s been like this for 20 years,” said Walter Schmidt, 71, a retired
mechanic out shopping in the Ruhr city of Bochum this week who is
opposed to helping Greece. “Germany has its own debts. And the Ruhr is
now very poor.”

The recent plunge in stock markets and the fall of the euro against the
dollar have been driven in large part by the fear that Germany would not
help cover the debts of overburdened euro zone members, given how
grudgingly and slowly the assistance for Greece came. The opposition
Social Democrats, who hope to return to power in North Rhine-Westphalia,
told members to abstain from the vote in the Bundestag on Friday.

Mrs. Merkel won passage of the legislation to support Greece despite
several members of her party breaking ranks and voting against it. She
has been roundly criticized by bailout opponents for what they deem a
giveaway to the irresponsible Greeks, a majority opinion in Germany, but
also by supporters for delaying the rescue and, in their view, fueling
instability in the financial markets raising the price tag. Adding to
her concerns, a group of academics Friday challenged the
constitutionality of the bailout before the country’s highest court in
Karlsruhe.

As she meets with European leaders in Brussels Friday night, Mrs. Merkel
must hope that the election in North Rhine-Westphalia remains focused on
local issues like education and does not become the day popular anger
boils over. A loss in Germany’s most populous state would not just
damage her politically, but could also cost her governing coalition its
majority in the upper house of Parliament, making it difficult to
advance her economic agenda.

The left-leaning bloc of the Social Democrats and the Green Party had
edged ahead of the conservative team of the Christian Democrats and the
Free Democrats, Mrs. Merkel’s ruling coalition on the federal level, in
recent polls.

“I’ve lived in this state for 20 years and I’ve never seen the people so
concerned about the future, about the economic and the social
situation,” said Franz Lehner, professor of applied social science at
the Ruhr University of Bochum. “The capability to survive of these
cities is really at stake,” said Mr. Lehner.

As an unseasonably frigid rain fell Thursday in Bochum, Dirk Schmidt,
35, a local party leader for Mrs. Merkel’s conservatives campaigned for
a seat in the state legislature at the Hannibal shopping center. He was
greeted with support from party members but also derision.

“The party disappointed me once with the east,” an old man pushing a
shopping cart shouted as one of Mr. Schmidt’s campaign workers offered
him a flier. “I won’t pay a cent for the Greeks.”

Mr. Schmidt said he did not believe Greece would be a decisive issue in
the election, but that “people mix everything in one pot,” local,
federal and international issues merging with the daily concerns of
households. “Greece is cursed a great deal. They say, ‘My pension is
being cut and we’re giving money for Greece,’” said Mr. Schmidt.

Bochum watched its Nokia cellphone factory pick up stakes two years ago
and move to Romania, with more than 2,000 jobs melting away in its wake.
The carmaker Opel, which once employed 25,000 people in the city, today
provides work for around 5,000 people, jobs that are also in jeopardy as
Opel’s corporate parent, General Motors, restructures its subsidiary.

Unemployment is 10.2 percent in Bochum, lower than in nearby Essen or
Dortmund, but well above the national rate of 8.1 percent. “You wouldn’t
believe how many old people, normally dressed, are collecting bottles in
front of the train station,” said Johannes Henke, 40, a Bochum taxi
driver standing under the shopping center overhang to stay out of the rain.

Like municipalities throughout the Ruhr, the city government is in deep
fiscal trouble. According to Paul Aschenbrenner, the Bochum city
director, the city was 1.4 billion euros in debt, or 3,690 euros for
each resident. The government has been forced to cut municipal jobs,
reduce the opening hours and increase prices at sports facilities and
raise fees at music schools.

Yet last year the city paid 9.1 million euros to help with projects in
the former East Germany, part of the 228 million euros it has paid in
the 20 years since the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, Mr.
Aschenbrenner said.

Christian Haardt, a Bochum city council member from Mrs. Merkel’s party
and also a candidate in the state election, stood on the bridge over
University Street this week, handing out coffee in orange CDU cups to
students on their way to classes. “Many people, myself included, are
making a fist in their pockets,” said Mr. Haardt, who has had to answer
constituent e-mail asking why Germany is paying for Greece.

“And we’re barely able to fill potholes,” Mr. Haardt said with a sigh.

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