Germany: with Olaf Scholz in power, Angela Merkel believes that she can "sleep peacefully"
German Chancellor Angela Merkel and her Finance Minister Olaf Scholz in Berlin, December 16, 2019. John Macdougall AFP / Archivos
Text by: RFI Follow
2 min
In a long interview given to the
“
Süddeutsche Zeitung
”
to be published this Saturday, October 23 in the morning, the Chancellor says she is serene at the idea of handing over to the Social Democrat Olaf Scholz.
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With our correspondent in Berlin,
Nathalie Versieux
"
With Olaf Scholz in power, I will sleep peacefully,
assures
Angela Merkel
in this interview with the
Süddeutsche Zeitung
,
even if there will of course be political differences, that goes without saying.
“Chancellor in 2005, the conservative leader does not fear a radical change in the budgetary policy of his country by passing the reins to the current Minister of Finance.
The Chancellor still does not know when she will hand over to her successor - a specificity of German institutions which want the outgoing Chancellor to stay in office until his successor has managed to find a coalition.
Olaf Scholz
hopes to achieve this by December 6, in which case Angela Merkel will miss Helmut Kohl's record for longevity in power by a few days.
"
Political climate has become rougher
"
In terms of regrets, she makes a short list.
With in mind the fact of having been the chancellor who deprived the children of school for long months for the first time since the war because of the health crisis which dominated the last two years of her mandate.
On the other hand, the Chancellor still resolutely refuses to classify the failures of her climate policy as failure.
She welcomes the progress made in the former GDR during the twelve years of her mandate and is worried about a "
political climate that has become more harsh
".
“
When I became chancellor, smartphones did not exist.
Facebook was a year old, Twitter was invented only a year later.
We live in a completely transformed media world, and that contributes to it,
”she explains on a daily basis.
The woman who is renowned for her aptitude for dialogue and her sense of compromise says, for example, that she fears "
more and more problems in reaching the development of compromises, which are essential in a democracy
".
►Also listen: Germany: sixteen years of “Merkel-mania”
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Germany
Angela Merkel