How and why the German press rejects Merkel’s handling of the pandemic
All the criticisms of some German newspapers on how the Merkel government is facing the Covid pandemic
Sic transit gloria mundi. The latest summit of the German crisis cabinet that launched a bizarre road map for the gradual relaxation of restrictive measures may have been a moment of interruption in the consent of citizens towards their government. The decisions have displeased everyone: the aperturists and the prudent, the traders and the consumers, the economists and the entrepreneurs, the teachers and the parents, the epidemiologists and perhaps even the conspiracy theorists. The compromise developed can rightly disprove the old saying according to which, if politics makes everyone unhappy, then it acts well. It is not so.
The government's new strategy to manage the second spring at the time of the pandemic can be summarized in a baroque, odd and twisted puzzle worthy of the Puzzle Week , so much so that to advertise it the regional presidents (who incidentally contributed in a decisive way) had to resort to a long sheet of paper, full of tables (if the incidence is tot click this, but as soon as it reaches tot click this other) and worthy of the ballot of an administrative election.
Prescriptions, however, already superfluous, since each Land is acting on its own, adjusting, modifying, forcing those guidelines in the name of federal autonomy.
To achieve this political-bureaucratic masterpiece, sixteen presidents of the Länder and some government ministers, led by a chancellor who again appears as tired as she is tired, scrambled for hours albeit in digital form. Over nine hours of confrontation, at the end of which the only thing that will remain for future memory is the verbal clash between the president of Bavaria Markus Söder (CSU) and the Minister of Finance Olaf Scholz (Spd), who may have represented the first bickering of the next election campaign (an episode that has displaced the other pretender to the candidacy for the conservatives, Armin Laschet). The tone of the confrontation: "I don't know what you've been drinking, here you are not the chancellor, you are not the king of Germany or the ruler of the world", the words of Söder, irritated by how the Minister of Finance was disposing of the funds for the regions; "But what you want to dispose of freely is taxpayers' money itself," the Social Democrat replied. In short, money.
The umpteenth crisis summit has blatantly certified Germany's difficulty in the face of the long wave of the pandemic, so much so that one suspects that the brilliant management of the first wave was due more to luck than to ability: the luck of having had a month ahead of the outbreak of the virus in Italy and to have closed everything before the covid could insinuate itself irremediably. Then ordinary administration. It is a debacle that does not only involve the federal government, but the entire German system. The summer passed without the lines of defense having been strengthened, the tragic example of the schools is enough, in which the hygiene and safety measures remained those of last spring, and the second autumn wave overwhelmed even what a few months before he seemed to be the top of his class (it is always inelegant to refer to oneself: but remember the correspondence from Germany full of praise that you still read in the Italian press in November and December? Well, here on Startmag.it you read more). To all this was added the launch of the vaccination campaign, branded by the same newspapers as "catastrophic". And not just because of the uncertainties in Brussels.
Now the German press presents the bill. "If the disenchantment with politics were to reach new heights soon, it will have a lot to do with the chancellor and the minister of health," writes Spiegel . “Neither Angela Merkel nor Jens Spahn have done their job since last summer. The country and its citizens would have longed for a fresh and energetic government. The current one has now permanently demonstrated that it is not possible ”.
The title of the comment is "A new government", but to have it we will have to wait many more months, until the elections on 26 September. And who knows if the long-term stable forecasts of a future black-green majority (CDU-CSU and Grünen) will not be reshuffled by sudden changes in voters' mood, especially towards the CDU: in the polls there are some initial cracks, while those on approval towards the management of the pandemic indicate that only half still support them, a few months ago the percentages were around 70%.
But the criticism goes deeper, it goes beyond the rediscovered weakness of a government formula. This situation “also shakes the self-attributions that have been cultivated for a long time”, Spiegel goes on , “for a long time we Germans have been convinced that we live in a modern, innovative and well-organized country. The pandemic has taken this disappointment away from us. If the Federal Republic were indeed a modern, innovative and well-organized country – and at the same time were lucky enough to have a lively, ambitious and vigilant political leadership, the situation would now look rosier. Then now there would have been good prospects for culture, gastronomy or for shopkeepers, there would have been prospects for more sociability, for more happiness in life ”.
“Germany's reputation in the world is less and less in line with reality”, adds the Tagesspiegel of Berlin, which in its title speaks of “relegation”. The criticisms are focused on the administrative sector, which is responsible for the implementation of political strategies in the field. "Slowness is a luxury that one must be able to afford", continues the newspaper, which instead denounces a German public sector "burdened which, as is now being demonstrated, is unable to provide services efficiently even in the event of an emergency" .
The example of the vaccination campaign is emblematic. The list of countries where the administration proceeds more rapidly, even in a situation of lack of doses, embarrasses the Germans: the Tagesspiegel mentions Mexico, Serbia, of course not to mention Israel, the forbidden dream, where now people are immunized in pubs later having obtained a barcode on your smartphone. A few days ago the tabloid Bild had published a British flag on the front page, with the title: "We envy you". It must have cost him a lot, after the many teasing sent last year to the address of "Mad Boris", but less and less than the return response of the popular The Sun , "We do not envy you", published in impeccable German.
"There was a time when Germany was envied for its efficient administration", writes the Tagesspiegel , assuming melancholy tones, "Lenin wanted to model socialism on the example of the Deutsche Post , German universities were the envy of the world". A reputation handed down from generation to generation: "The baby boomers, now on their way to their sixties, have grown up knowing that they live in the most functioning country in the world". Then came a dramatic crisis to reveal that the king is naked.
The hope of the Tagesspiegel is that the country becomes aware of these delays and achieves a wing blow: “The current crisis should be an opportunity to undertake a profound administrative reform. Their structures are so encrusted that those responsible find it easier to lock up an entire population than to equip the health authorities with uniform software ”. Not exactly a great balance at the end of 16 years of Merkel governments.
This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/mondo/come-e-perche-la-stampa-tedesca-boccia-la-gestione-merkel-della-pandemia/ on Fri, 05 Mar 2021 12:38:17 +0000.