Angela Merkel, 15 years in power
Audio 02:35
German Chancellor Angela Merkel is due to leave her post next fall, without having really chosen a successor.
POOL / AFP
By: Bruno Daroux Follow
6 min
German Chancellor Angela Merkel celebrates her 15 years at the head of the country this Sunday, November 22, 2020.
With record popularity: 73% good opinions.
How to explain this exceptional longevity?
Publicity
The exceptional longevity of Angel Merkel can be explained primarily by his personal and political qualities.
She came to power in 2005, after having, in the shadow of her mentor Helmut Kohl, climbed the ranks of her party the CDU until taking the head in 2000.
Once elected chancellor, Angela Merkel, pastor's daughter, from the east of the country, from the former socialist republic of the GDR, keeps her simple ways.
She's not an extrovert.
She does not like the "coup de com '", the excitement, the punchy statements.
And this is one of its paradoxes: it does not a priori tick the right boxes to occupy the highest office in the country.
Far from being charismatic, she can even appear lifeless and boring.
Disabilities therefore at first glance.
But which she will make strengths.
Better still, its trademark.
Speeches without a sleeve effect.
This trained physicist likes clear, precise and nuanced statements.
This sober form of communication appealed to the Germans.
Unlike some of her male peers, Angela Merkel has never been dazzled by the golds of power.
Never let it be told, either.
Rigor, patience, listening, this is his credo.
The work, the files.
The substance before the form.
A form of determined prudence which will have helped her in the end to make decisions which have often proved effective and sometimes even daring.
Like his decision, against some of his relatives, to welcome more than a million migrants in the summer of 2015, or to transgress a taboo of his political family by accepting in the spring the idea of a common European debt to finance half of the European Union's recovery plan.
Audacity and pragmatism, which have enabled her to be re-elected three times since 2005.
She also knew how to manage the internal tensions within her formation between the centrists and the radicals of the CDU, and to accept, when the outcome of the polls required it, to govern in coalition with the social democrats of the SPD.
And then, and this is the mark of major politicians, while it was going through a bad poll, it was able to bounce back with its management of the Covid-19 pandemic, speaking a language of truth to the Germans, and obtaining results much better than some of its European neighbors.
She therefore managed to bypass the wear and tear of power that was beginning to make itself felt.
Angela Merkel is due to leave her post next fall, without really having chosen a successor.
Several CDU leaders are trying to get themselves nominated at the head of the party to lead their training to the elections next September.
But due to a pandemic, the CDU congress scheduled for two weeks, has been postponed until next year.
And the battle promises to be tough between the main candidates.
From this point of view, the Chancellor will not have succeeded - or not wanted - to designate a dolphin or a dauphine.
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Germany
Angela Merkel
European Union