Merkel rival Seehofer steps down as leader of sister party

HORST SEEHOFER, the German interior minister and one of Angela Merkel’s most prominent political rivals, announced his resignation as leader of her Bavarian sister party yesterday.

Mr Seehofer said he would stand down as leader of the Christian Social Union (CSU) early next year, but insisted he wanted to stay on as German interior minister.

“I will resign from the party leadership. That decision is final,” he told a press conference in Saxony. “My office as interior minister is completely unaffected by this. I will continue to serve.”

Mr Seehofer has been under pressure to resign as party leader since the CSU suffered heavy losses in regional elections in Bavaria last month.

Whether he can stay on as interior minister will depend on whether his party backs him to remain in the role or decides his time in front-line politics is over. By standing down as leader but attempting to stay on in government he is emulating Mrs Merkel, who announced last month that she would step down as leader of her Christian Democrat party (CDU) but wants to serve out her final term as chancellor.

Long known for his personal rivalry with Mrs Merkel, Mr Seehofer brought her coalition government to the brink of collapse in a power struggle over migration policy earlier this year.

His threat to pull the CSU out of the coalition unless Mrs Merkel agreed to his demand to turn back migrants at the German border was widely seen as an attempt to head off the challenge from the nationalist Alternative for Germany party (AFD) in Bavarian regional elections.

However, it backfired spectacularly. The CSU lost votes to the pro-migrant Greens as well as the AFD, and voters said they were unhappy with the tur- moil in Berlin. Mr Seehofer appears to have finished Mrs Merkel’s political career at the cost of his own.

According to German press reports, he agreed to step down as CSU leader at a tense party meeting on Sunday night.

Senior party figures were said to be ready to tell Mr Seehofer he had to go if he did not agree.

“They had the daggers in their robes, but they didn’t have to pull them out,” Bild newspaper commented.