Merkel's
Last Stand? Chancellor Running Out of Time on Refugee Issue
The
mood in Germany is rapidly shifting, and Chancellor Angela Merkel is
under fire.
January 19, 2016 –
06:20 PM
Angela Merkel has
repeatedly said that it will take time to solve the refugee crisis.
But impatience is growing, particularly following the sexual assaults
in Cologne. Voices of discontent are getting louder and the
chancellor's hold on power may be weakening. By SPIEGEL Staff
The most unusual
tribunal in the republic meets around 25 times per year, usually on
Tuesdays in the gray-panelled conference room on the third floor of
the Reichstag where conservative parliamentarians often meet. At the
front sits the defendant, German Chancellor Angela Merkel. Her
accusers sit at the long rows of tables before her, the three or four
dozen back benchers who are increasingly adopting the tone of a
public prosecutor when addressing Merkel's refugee policies.
Last week saw the
most recent such session. "We must finally begin to effectively
register the refugees," said Armin Schuster, a member of
Merkel's Christian Democrats who specializes in domestic affairs. "We
can't keep quiet about uncomfortable truths," complained
fellow-CDU member Klaus-Peter Willsch. Mark Hauptmann, another
conservative from the state of Thuringia, said: "We have to
reduce the number of illegal migrants coming to Germany from the
Balkans."
The accused, who in
the past had made a habit of delivering extended remarks in her own
defense, said nothing this time in response. She silently listened to
the accusations while tapping listlessly into her mobile phone or
staring at the ceiling in annoyance.
It wasn't all that
long ago that things were radically different. Only a month ago, the
CDU met in Karlsruhe for its annual party conference and Merkel's
refugee policies received a standing ovation. Merkel took the stage
intent on placating her critics and she promised a "noticeable
decrease" in the number of refugees coming to Germany. The
pledge was well received by the delegates present -- such that
newspapers wrote afterwards of Merkel's "triumph."
But then came New
Year's Eve in Cologne, and since then everything has changed -- both
in Merkel's party and across the country. The occasionally shrill
debates in talk shows, on the Internet and on the streets have become
even shriller. Among politicians in Berlin, calls for something to be
done have grown both in number and volume. And within the population,
where attitudes toward Merkel's policies have for months wavered
between sympathy and skepticism, concerns are growing: Will the
effort to integrate more than a million refugees overwhelm German
society? Can the government still guarantee the safety of its
citizens? Is the state failing?
And the pressure is
rising quickly in Berlin as well. On Tuesday, the Chancellery
received a letter signed by 44 conservative parliamentarians
demanding that Merkel reverse course on the refugee issue. "Just
as in similar cases in the past," one of the initiators told the
German press agency DPA, "we expect an answer within a week."
Merkel's decision to
offer shelter to the greatest possible number of refugees from the
horrors of the Syrian civil war remains the correct one. And it is
understandable that Merkel is hesitant to close Germany's borders
because of the danger that such a move might spell an end to
border-free travel in Europe.
'High-Minded Folly'
But Merkel has
failed to promptly impose order on the streams of refugees flowing
into the country. Now, even her supporters are concerned that her
plan for a European solution to the problem could fail. Former
allies, such as the government of Sweden, have reintroduced tight
border controls. Conservative German Constitutional Court justices
such as Udo Di Fabio and Hans-Jürgen Papier have accused Merkel of
making grave mistakes. And even a center-left paper like the New York
Times, which for much of 2015 couldn't praise Merkel's refugee
policies enough, recently published a column describing her course as
a "high-minded folly."
Among German
conservatives, as well, the criticism has grown sharper. If at all
possible, Merkel would like to stick with her policies. But within
her CDU, many believe that there isn't enough time left for her plan
to find success. The CDU's Bavarian sister party, the Christian
Social Union (CSU), has recently turned the screws even tighter. "In
the next 14 days, we will submit a written demand to the federal
government to reestablish legally regulated conditions at the
borders," said CSU head Horst Seehofer recently. "If it
does not do so, the Bavarian government will have no choice but to
submit a complaint to the Federal Constitutional Court."
The clock has begun
to tick. Either Merkel and Seehofer will be able to find a compromise
prior to an important trio of state elections in March. Or the
chancellor faces a lasting power struggle with her own political
allies -- a tussle that could ultimately cost her the Chancellery.
The fact that the
refugee crisis has now intensified is not entirely due to the
scandalous events on New Year's Eve in Cologne. The primary reason is
that Merkel has made little progress with her plan to stop the inflow
of refugees at the EU's external borders. Negotiations with Turkey
have faltered and Germany's neighbors in the Continent's south and
east are refusing to help. "Europe," a member of Merkel's
cabinet recently complained, "is leaving us hanging."
Just last fall,
Merkel hammered out a promising plan together with European
Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker. The idea was for refugees
arriving in Europe by boat or ferry to be registered in special camps
(known as hotspots) in Greece and Italy before being distributed in
fixed quotas among the other EU member states. At the same time,
Brussels hoped to seal off Europe's Mediterranean beaches with the
help of the EU border control agency Frontex, if necessary over the
opposition of the countries in question.
A Redistribution
Farce
Thus far, though,
such plans are more theory than practice. The so-called initial
reception facilities lack the means to even take the fingerprints of
all those arriving. In order to fix the problem, the European
Commission recently authorized emergency funds to acquire 90
fingerprint machines.
At the same time,
the plan to redistribute 160,000 refugees across the EU has become a
farce. The plan was agreed to back in September, but by Jan. 7, a
mere 272 people had been resettled. Even worse, the resistance isn't
just coming from the most vocal critics of Merkel's refugee policy in
Poland and Hungary. Her supposed allies in the heart of the EU are
also protesting. "Almost none of the countries in the EU are
implementing the decisions made in the European Council, neither in
the east or the west," complained Council President Donald Tusk
last Tuesday at a meeting with Social Democrats in the European
Parliament.
As such, Merkel can,
for the time being, forget about her idea of bringing fixed
contingents of refugees to Europe directly from Turkey. Even EU
countries that count among her allies first want to see a reduction
in the number of refugees coming to Europe.
The horrors
experienced by the women in Cologne on New Year's Eve have also done
their part to reduce the willingness to accept refugees, particularly
in Eastern Europe. "We don't want something like what happened
in Germany taking place in Slovakia," the country's prime
minister, Robert Fico, said in Bratislava earlier this month.
In addition, Turkey
is also letting Merkel squirm. There have been some positive signals,
Frans Timmermans, deputy president of the European Commission, said
after a visit to Turkey early last week. But EU officials have noted
in recent months that it's not just Syrians and Afghans who are
traveling through Turkey on their way to Europe, but also people from
North Africa -- allegedly because the partly state-owned Turkish
Airlines is profiting handsomely on flights from the region. The vast
majority of those coming from North Africa are ineligible for asylum,
but have proven difficult to deport due to a lack of cooperation from
their home countries.
Experts in Brussels
are thus running out of hope that the number of refugees flowing into
Europe can be quickly reduced. At the moment, some 3,000 people are
arriving in Greece every day, and that's in January with storms
raging in the Aegean Sea. Soon, though, temperatures will start to
rise and the crossing will become easier once again.
German conservatives
are no longer willing to simply hope the refugee influx will slow on
its own. Just how bad the mood has become became apparent last Monday
in Berlin, when Bundestag members from Bavaria and Baden-Württemberg
held a joint meeting. One parliamentarian after the other demanded
stricter border controls and an upper limit to the number of refugees
Germany can accept. Bavarian conservatives with the CSU have been
demanding such measures for some time. But the CDU parliamentarians
from Baden-Württemberg "are now even more radical than we are,"
said a CSU parliamentarian approvingly.
The letter delivered
to the Chancellery this Tuesday likewise demands the introduction of
an upper limit. "Germany cannot handle more than 200,000
immigrants per year, whether they are civil war refugees or
asylum-seekers," reads the letter, which SPIEGEL ONLINE has
seen. The CSU has long been demanding that the upper limit for
immigration be set at 200,000 annually. "We are extremely
concerned," the letter continues, "that without the quick
introduction of a limit, far more refugees could come to Germany in
2016 than arrived in 2015." According to official statistics,
just short of 1.1 million refugees, migrants and asylum seekers
crossed into Germany in 2015, though it is unclear how many of those
may have been registered twice or continued on to other European
countries.
Finding a Different
Path
Even a member of
Merkel's cabinet has recently begun publicly opposing Chancellor
Merkel's course. Transportation Minister Alexander Dobrindt, a member
of the CSU, warned that the crimes committed in Cologne have made
Germans deeply concerned about their security. "The more people
feel personally affected, the more they begin to question the core
competence of the conservative parties," Dobrindt warned.
Many conservatives
share his view. At the meeting of parliamentary conservatives last
Tuesday, representatives who had thus far supported Merkel's refugee
policies voiced concern. Even leading CSU parliamentarian Gerda
Hasselfeldt, who has often sought to mediate between Merkel and
Seehofer, demanded vehemently -- for her -- that it has to be
possible to turn refugees away at the border if they are not in
possession of valid identification. Loyal conservatives like Hesse
Governor Volker Bouffier have likewise gone public with their doubts
about Merkel's plan: "I am still in favor of a European
solution," he said. "But if progress is blocked in Europe,
then one has to find a different path."
The number of
extremist hate mails and emails directed at the parliamentarians is
not the only thing that has spiked. The number of queries from
unsettled Germans who have nothing to do with xenophobic movements
like Pegida or other right-wing groups has likewise increased
significantly. That has led many parliamentarians who had thus far
supported Merkel to change their approach. "Those in favor of a
different strategy are now distinctly in the majority," says one
representative.
Of particular
concern for Merkel is that a growing number of parliamentarians are
less worried that their criticism might damage the chancellor. "Thus
far, there was a consensus that we had to solve the refugee crisis
with Merkel at the helm," says a senior CDU politician. "Now,
some are saying, we have to solve the problem, without Merkel if
necessary. That is still a minority, but it is a growing minority."
Just as it has for
the past several months, however, the greatest pressure is coming
from the CSU. With his announcement that he might file a complaint
against Merkel in the Federal Constitutional Court, Seehofer isn't
just making a concession to party hardliners like Bavarian Finance
Minister Markus Söder, who is demanding that Merkel's refugee
policies be put up for a vote in federal parliament. Seehofer is also
thinking about his state's financial interests. Bavaria, after all,
is on the frontlines of the refugee crisis, with the vast majority of
migrants entering Germany through Bavaria's border with Austria. Were
the court to rule in Bavaria's favor, Seehofer has indicated, he
would make new financial demands from Berlin. "Against that
background, one must now more than ever think about whether the
federal government must participate to a greater degree in the
costs," says Seehofer.
Danger Ahead
Money has always
been a good argument in politics, but votes are even more important.
And here too there is bad news for Merkel. Many conservatives have
long been hoping that losses in the upcoming state elections could be
limited. Internally, the CDU wasn't particularly concerned about the
right-wing populist party Alternative for Germany (AfD) gaining a bit
of support so long as the CDU was able to emerge as the strongest
party and secure the governor position.
But recent surveys
now show that the CDU result could be worse than feared. Those
surveys show that the AfD may not just exceed the five-percent hurdle
for parliamentary representation in March, but could also emerge with
a two-digit result in Baden-Württemberg. Furthermore, sinking CDU
poll numbers in both Baden-Württemberg and Rhineland-Palatinate make
it possible that Merkel's party could emerge from both state
elections without the governorship, depending on the make-up of the
ultimate governing coalition. That would be a disaster for Merkel.
Defeats in important state elections have always been dangerous for
sitting chancellors, most recently hastening the end of Gerhard
Schröder's term in office.
Merkel is fully
aware that she is running out of time. If she isn't soon able to
demonstrate that she is making headway, she could be in trouble. Even
her own confidants say as much. "Then we would be facing a power
struggle," says one.
Chancellor Merkel,
for her part, continues to insist that proposals made by her
opponents won't work. Closing the border to Austria? She believes
that doing so risks setting off a domino-effect that would ultimately
destroy the Schengen border-free travel regime and destabilize the
Balkans.
Merkel is
particularly concerned about the gradual erosion of her authority.
Throughout her time in office, she has earned a reputation as someone
who has mastered all of the crises facing Germany and Europe. Now,
however, every promise Merkel makes is bursting like a soap bubble.
German voters are watching Merkel fail at one of the most fundamental
tasks facing a state: That of controlling who enters the country.
The Chancellery, of
course, has long since begun working on a potential Plan B. But it
won't be the complete sealing of Germany's borders: The loss of face
for Merkel would be too great. Instead, aids are looking at other
possibilities, including that of turning away certain groups -- those
from Afghanistan, for example -- at the border. That would at least
demonstrate a desire to reassert control over the German border
without necessarily putting an end to the idea of open borders in
Europe.
Help from the
Balkans
Among conservative
leaders, another idea, one favored by the Austrians, is gaining
support. The plan calls for German and Austrian police to assist
their colleagues in Slovenia, and possibly Croatia as well, with
securing the EU's external borders. Asylum-seekers trying to enter
with forged documents or with no papers at all would be turned back.
The hope is that such a plan would significantly reduce the number of
refugees coming to Europe by way of the so-called Balkan Route.
Last Wednesday,
Austrian Interior Minister Johanna Mikl-Leitner spoke about the
proposal with Emily Haber, state secretary in the German Interior
Ministry. It is well-known that German Interior Minister Thomas de
Maizière is not opposed to preventing certain groups of refugees
from entering Germany in the first place. Out of loyalty to Merkel,
however, he has thus far not issued the relevant orders to Germany's
federal police force.
Shifting the onus
for control onto the Slovenian and Croatian border would raise a
number of practical and legal questions. Politically, though, it
would be an elegant solution, allowing Merkel to make a partial
retreat without loss of face and making it possible to reach a
compromise with the CSU.
Sources in the
Interior Ministry say that they will soon begin looking intensively
at the Austrian proposal: "Quickly and with the necessary care."
By Melanie Amann,
Peter Müller, Ralf Neukirch, René Pfister, Michael Sauga and
Christoph Schult
Sem comentários:
Enviar um comentário