Who is (and what does he think) Röttgen, the third candidate to lead the CDU
Röttgen is the youngest of the contenders running for leadership of the CDU. The in-depth study by Pierluigi Mennitti from Berlin
From favorite to repudiated, from dolphin to trout. It was the parable of Norbert Röttgen, the third candidate for leadership of the CDU, once the most loyal of the Merkelians, pampered as the papal successor of the chancellor when he decided to leave the deck, then suddenly fell into the abyss of darkness. Like Lucifer.
Born in 1965, Röttgen is the youngest of the contenders in the race. Candidate by chance, third wheel, true outsider of a race that had to be two. A way to recover the lost scene, after the last years spent at the helm of the foreign commission of the Bundestag , an expert in a subject that until a few years ago was not very passionate in Germany. On the other hand, it is the economy that moves the country, even in its foreign projection.
In that commission, Röttgen had found refuge after being thrown off the front line following the badly lost election campaign in 2012, in the very North Rhine-Westphalia that Armin Laschet would have regained five years later. He lost a competition he had already won, as federal Minister of the Environment in office, slipping on one banana peel after another, until a catastrophic declaration of surrender within days of the vote, when he had sensed that it would end badly. To the classic question whether, in case of defeat, he would have remained in the region to be the leader of the opposition, the tapino replied that no, he had only presented himself to be the president of the Land and if the citizens had not elected him he would have decided with his party what to do. Anyone who has chewed a little on election campaigns knows that such an answer is tantamount to shooting themselves in the foot. Obviously he lost the elections and when he returned to the capital he found a furious Angela Merkel with the letter of her resignation as minister in hand. A welcome without many pleasantries, after a few hours in his place in the Environment was seated a new faithful, Peter Altmaier. The press spoke of the personal "greatest humiliation", of a real "political execution". Cynicism is one of the various pillars that have supported Merkel's political power: in that election campaign she understood that Röttgen lacked the “quid”.
Therefore, having re-proposed himself to the judgment of party delegates is for Röttgen a bit like going in search of the lost “quid”. Diligent MP, elegant speech, affable character, Röttgen is the American of the trio, more than Merz than "American" he really was, since he led the German section of BlackRock during the years of his break from politics. The lawyer from Meckenheim, a small town a few kilometers from Bonn and Cologne, is the vice-president of Atlantik Brücke (president is the former Foreign Minister Spd Sigmar Gabriel, who succeeded Friedrich Merz's ten years in 2019), group of interest constituted by politicians, entrepreneurs, science and journalism, which takes care of relations between Germany and the USA. He entered the Bundestag at a very young age, still in Kohl's era in 1994, and found himself eleven years later parliamentary secretary of the CDU, the equivalent of the British Chief Whip. It was the beginning of Angela Merkel's chancellery. He did an excellent job, getting into the good graces of the chancellor, who in her second government, the only one not of the Grosse Koalition, took him with her to the Ministry of the Environment. Those were the years of the center-right executive with the liberals, of the farewell to nuclear power after the Fukushima accident: Röttgen was entrusted with the management of the Energiewende, the green energy turning point. Moreover, the Department of the Environment was Merkel's first ministry, when she was still “Kohl's girlfriend”: Röttgen's appointment seemed almost a viaticum towards a career as a predestined one. Then the stumbling block in the regional elections in North Rhine-Westphalia and the damnatio memoriae.
In the meantime he has built up his expertise as a foreign expert, in the wake of the Atlanticist tradition of the CDU of the past. Compared to the Merkelian orientation, there is a greater emphasis towards China on reciprocity for companies and on civil rights and, above all, a clear opposition to Huawei's participation in the 5G infrastructure. The dissonance with Russia is more pronounced, also with respect to Laschet's position, so much so that the president of the Foreign Affairs Commission is the only one to bring criticism to the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline to the point of asking for it to stop, agreeing it with all European countries . Only on US sanctions for the Röttgen pipeline does it find coincidences with the government line: these are measures that must never be taken against an allied country.
The latest shot fired on the eve of congress is a torpedo to a possible future government alliance with liberals, justified as a reaction to the FDP's abandonment of government talks in 2017, as Merkel sought to build a three-party alliance. along with greens. “It is not possible to govern with those who show such irresponsibility,” Röttgen said. However, some observers consider this exit as a mistake: a politician should never close options at the start.
No one, even a few months ago, would have bet a euro on the possibility that Röttgen could really play a chance at the congress. His decision appeared as a flag candidacy, a testament to his own existence and the desire to return to play an important role in the post-Merkel party. Maybe with an eye on the foreign ministry in a future government. In recent months, however, the two most accredited candidates, Laschet and Merz, have lost ground. The muffled atmosphere that, due to the pandemic, accompanied the internal campaign of the candidates did not allow for an open and combative confrontation. And so as Laschet and Merz lost altitude, Röttgen emerged as the relaxed and calm candidate, like a Forrest Gump who happened to be at the right time. His moderate tone appeals to many, including some business associations, which have shown him satisfaction with respect to the more popular (from the point of view of economic competence) Merz.
With Röttgen, the party could also initiate a phase of renewal in the wake of the modernizing policies that characterized Merkel's long season. For him, the CDU must remain firmly at the center of the political scene, no skids to the right. And it must become a protagonist in the fight against climate change through the use of technologies. A greener CDU, without chasing the ecological party: for Röttgen the challenge of the new party is to identify climate policies compatible with the market economy.
With him, more than with the others, the question of the chancellery would also remain open, there would be space to evaluate at the right moment the best candidacy, perhaps that of the president of the CSU Markus Söder or the Minister of Health Jens Spahn (who, however, in congress makes tickets with Laschet). An availability that could move some votes to the congress, where the delegates will also be careful to evaluate which president can guarantee a successful future for the party (and therefore for themselves). Röttgen has left the question open, Merz has already made it clear that, if elected, he will be the candidate, while Laschet has shown himself ambiguous and only catastrophic polls could force him to pass his hand.
In short, a quiet leader could paradoxically offer the party more room for maneuver. This could perhaps be Röttgen's “quid”. Some observers go so far as to predict that the first round of the congressional vote will be a fratricidal challenge between him and Laschet , who insist a little on the same area of delegates. Who will prevail, will go to challenge Merz to the ballot, with the hope of making the full votes of the excluded. Speculations. This time, with the distance imposed by the pandemic, it was really difficult for everyone to take the pulse of the delegates. Now everyone is saying that the race is open, also to hide the impossibility of making a prediction. In addition, the digital format of the congress will penalize those capable of great rhetoric and arousing emotions. And who knows if the least expected candidate will emerge from a “cold” congress.
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This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/mondo/chi-e-e-cosa-pensa-rottgen-terzo-candidato-alla-guida-della-cdu/ on Fri, 15 Jan 2021 08:40:13 +0000.