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| Angela Merkel, leader of Germany's conservative Christian Democratic Union party (CDU) sits in her limousine as she arrives for a party leaders meeting in Berlin October 10, 2005. (Reuters photo) | BERLIN, Oct. 10 (Xinhuanet) -- German conservative leader Angela Merkel Monday confirmed
her victory as next chancellor in a grand coalition government with the
Social Democratic Party (SPD) as a junior partner. The SPD has accepted their
fate but reportedly won major cabinet posts.
"The Christian Democratic alliance (CDU/CSU) will occupy the chancellery,"
Merkel announced at her first press conference as German Chancellor-designate.
She said her party had voted unanimously to open formal negotiations for a government
with the SPD, expected to start next week and last through Nov. 12.
Merkel, to be the first woman chancellor in German history, made the
announcement after meeting her top aides and holding another face-to-face
meeting with incumbent Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder and SPD Chairman Franz
Muentefering.
She labelled the deal, reached after Schroeder agreed to step aside, "good
and fair" and said the parties agreed that "there is no alternative to a reform
course" for Germany.
She said a grand coalition with Social Democrats would have towork on
policies that help create new jobs in a "coalition of new possibilities."
"We have achieved something big, we have the basis for coalition talks,"
she said.
The two sides have edged closer on key issues such as the labor market
reform, social welfare system and public finances.
On the same day, emerging from the summit of the two parties, Muentefering
told his press conference that the SPD accepted coalition negotiations with two
votes against it and seven abstentions.
He said that his party had accepted the decision for Merkel aschancellor "with respect", but admitted that in the new cabinet the SPD would have less might than in the last government.
But observers here said the SPD has squeezed great compromise from the CDU
alliance.
Under the agreement, each party will control eight ministries, but the SPD
has reportedly grasped almost all the major ministerial posts such as the
foreign, finance, labor, justice, health, transport, environment and foreign
aid.
The CDU/CSU will get the defense ministry, the interior and a new ministry
for economics and high technology, according to the German news agency DPA.
Wolfgang Schaeuble, former chairman of the CDU, will be interior minister
while the CSU's chairman Edmund Stoiber will head the new ministry for economics
and high technology.
Muentefering said that outgoing Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder will
participate in formal coalition talks.
But he did not say anything concerning Schroeder's future rolein the
government. But some CDU officials revealed that Schroeder would play no role in
the new government.
Muentefering said that SPD members will probably vote on the coalition
agreement with the CDU/CSU during a party convention in the southwestern town of
Karlsruhe scheduled for Nov. 14-16.
However, under Germany's election law, the chancellor should be elected by
the Bundestag or the low house of the parliament.
As a result, the agreement between the SPD and CDU/CSU is "nota done deal"
as several SPD members have vowed to vote against Merkel in the Bundestag.
The outcome is to end weeks-long political crisis resulted from the Sept.
18 elections, in which neither the SPD-Green coalition nor the CDU/ CSU-FDP
alliance won a majority.
The CDU/CSU seized 226 seats in the Bundestag, four more than that of the
SPD.
After attempts to join hands with smaller parties failed, the SPD and CDU/CSU have sought to forge a grand coalition government, which was once seen between 1966 and 1969. Enditem | 
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