Angela Merkel’s victory prompts mixed response in Europe

Angela Merkel’s strong showing in the German election on Sunday has prompted diverging reactions across Europe as well as some soul-searching by governments who had fallen on rockier times during the eurozone crisis.

The chancellor’s comprehensive victory has prompted calls from the French right for bolder economic reforms to address the country’s declining competitiveness.

“François Hollande should take note of the victory of Angela Merkel and what that means – the success of a model that French now feel he should take inspiration,” said an editorial in Monday’s Le Figaro.

The French people had overwhelmingly supported Ms Merkel in the election, with 56 per cent saying they would vote for her if they were German and a similar number saying her re-election was in the interests of France.

By contrast, the latest IFOP poll on Sunday showed Mr Holland’s approval rating at an all-time low of 23 per cent, close to the lowest ever score for a French president, the 22 per cent recorded in 1991 by Francois Mitterand.

Luc Chatel, deputy vice-president of the opposition UMP party, said: “I would like to turn to the president of the republic and say ‘take the initiative, you are going to govern four years with Angela Merkel, take her hand’.”

Berlin has also made little secret of its wish to see tougher action on pensions and labour markets by Paris. French growth forecast are set to remain flat this year and unemployment is predicted to top 11 per cent of the workforce.

But the French government believes that a grand coalition of centre-left and centre-right between Ms Merkel’s Christian Democrats and Peer Steinbrück’s Social Democratic party will best help to push forward its own interests in Europe.

Paris would like to see Berlin adopt policies such as a minimum wage to boost German consumption and help narrow the gap with France’s high labour costs.

Mr Hollande is also anxious to see progress on issues such as establishing a banking union to underpin financial stability in the eurozone and, ultimately, the issuance of mutually guaranteed eurobonds.

“The new coalition is likely to be slightly more amenable on some issues such as banking union, although changes are likely to be minor,” said Thomas Klau of the European Council on Foreign Relations in Paris.

“She [Ms Merkel] is going to remain very much in control,” he added.

In depth

Germany elections

Despite steering the Christian Democrats to their best result in more than 20 years, Angela Merkel still has to search for a reliable coalition partner to form a new government

The French president was the first European leader to congratulate Ms Merkel on her victory on Sunday night.

In a conversation the two leaders expressed their wish to “continue their close co-operation in order to meet the new challenges of European integration”, according to a statement from the Elysee.

Arnaud Montebourg, industry minister, said: “The shared responsibility we have is to redirect Europe, to ensure that this area, which is the only area of the world in recession, once again becomes a growth area.”

Reaction across other European capitals reflected some of the political and economic challenges facing member states.

In the Netherlands, there was widespread admiration for the stability of the German political system and for Ms Merkel’s ability to retain popularity in the face of the European economic crisis of the past three years.

Many Dutch were impressed by the ability of Germany’s centrist parties to maintain or even increase their vote share. In the Netherlands, voters have spun increasingly towards the political fringes in recent years, with polls showing the far-right Party for Freedom in the lead.

At the same time, some commentators noted that the Dutch currently have a right-left “grand coalition”, pairing the centre-right Liberals and centre-left Labour party, and that it has proved disastrous for both parties’ popularity, especially Labour’s. That could serve as a warning against Ms Merkel’s likely plan for a grand coalition with the SPD.

Enrico Letta, Italy’s prime minister, congratulated Ms Merkel and expressed his satisfaction that the anti-euro AFD party was shut out of parliament.

“Fiscal discipline preserved and Italy remains a hostage” was the headline reaction in Il Giornale, a rightwing daily owned by the Berlusconi family. In a strongly anti-German commentary, reflecting former prime minister Silvio Berlusconi’s election campaign in February, the Milan daily said the chancellor’s policies had brought peripheral eurozone countries to their knees while keeping Germany’s debt interest payments close to zero. “The hard line towards the PIGS has paid off. And now she [Merkel] will carry it forward.”

Mario Monti, former technocrat prime minister and now leader of the small centrist Civic Alliance, told La Stampa, a Turin daily, that a grand coalition in Germany could lead to improvements in Europe without the “obstacles” that the FDP had put in the way of further European integration. Mr Monti expressed hope that Ms Merkel would now pay more attention to the need to promote economic growth in Europe.

La Stampa in its own commentary said Ms Merkel’s third victory had broken the “rule” that incumbent governments lose elections. Calling her astute, tactical and cold, the daily said she was the incarnation of small German virtues.

The result would give no comfort to troubled eurozone countries hoping for ideological turning points or a tearing up of the “dogma of budget discipline”, Corriere della Sera, Italy’s leading daily, said in a front-page commentary.

Additional reporting by Matt Steinglass in Amsterdam and Guy Dinmore in Rome