Merkel forced to retreat as FDP plays hardball

Angela Merkel’s centre-right coalition has come dangerously close to rupture after her Free Democrat (FDP) partners defied the chancellor and backed an opposition candidate for the German presidency.

Conservative leaders warned the FDP on Sunday there would be “serious consequences” – language party officials understood to mean the end of the coalition – if they refused to drop support for former East German rights activist Joachim Gauck. But the FDP did not blink and it was Ms Merkel who ended up backing down and agreeing to support Mr Gauck, whose candidacy she had publicly opposed in 2010.

“It was indeed quite serious,” said one senior conservative source close to Ms Merkel.

Ms Merkel’s retreat kept her centre-right coalition together but the episode appears to have poisoned relations and may herald more tensions in the run-up to next year’s general election.

Ms Merkel’s Christian Democrats (CDU) and their Christian Social Union (CSU) sister party have run roughshod over the FDP since the coalition was formed in 2009, confident the liberal party – whose support has plunged to 2 per cent in opinion polls – would swallow anything to avoid new elections.

When the FDP surprisingly drew a line in the sand over the coalition’s candidate to replace Christian Wulff, a hand-picked Ms Merkel choice for president who resigned on Friday over a financial favours scandal, the conservatives switched tactics.

“They were caught off guard when we came out for Gauck,” said a senior FDP source. “Merkel and others warned about ‘consequences’, which we all understood to mean a threat to end the coalition [and call elections].”