The rejection of Friedrich Merz at the first vote on the chancellor investiture, a fact that has never happened before, “it was certainly not a good start”, but what is important is that “we immediately corrected the problem and shown that the majority holds”. Speaking in his office at the European Parliament in Strasbourg, in a pause of the plenary works, the MEP of the SPD Tobias Cremer minimizes what happened on Tuesday at the Bundestag.
“We have to put in perspective what happened, we must keep in mind that the majority we have is much more restricted than once (only 13 deputies, editor’s note). In the first term of Angela Merkel we had about fifty deputies of her own majority that voted against her and it was not a problem,” he says in an interview with Toray.it.
Merz not weakened
In his opinion “there was nothing organized”, and whoever voted against “was an irresponsible”, but the important thing “is that the problem was corrected in a few hours, thanks to the support of the opposition, and this I believe that it shows that our democracy holds and works, that the majority is standing, that we have a chancellor and a government in operation and now everything is smooth”.
Merz makes it and passes to the second round: but it will be an weakened chancellor
For the deputy, a member of the Foreign Affairs Commission of the European Parliament, “Merz does not come out weakened”, despite his bad figure, and indeed with his double mission in Poland and France on the first day in charge, “proves to be already in action”. Indeed, he recalls, “he acted even before entering in office, approving the suspension of the brake to debt that will allow to implement a 500 billion plan for investments in defense and infrastructure”.
United to combat Trump
Cremer believes that Merz will prove to be a “reliable” leader, who will work “not to guide Europe alone, but to guarantee its unity. Leadership also means uniting and the question we have to answer is: how can we make sure that Europe is united? Because Donald Trump knows it very well, that he will win” the commercial war “if he manages to divide us.
This is why each of us plays a role to play. Germany will have it but Italy will also have it. “What must understand” is that the economies of European countries together are as large as American, if not more, and we are 450 million citizens. And he knows he has to negotiate with united Europe “.
Europe must demonstrate that they are united and compact because it must face “a huge geopolitical change”, to the fact that “the world is now multipolar”, and therefore must confront, albeit in a different way, with the Russia of Vladimir Putin on one side, and with the USA of Trump on the other. To both of them it must prove to be above all able to defend itself, albeit for different reasons.
The ‘Refinct’ key no longer works
“Many say that Trump was an alarm clock for Europe. But I believe that the alarm was playing for some time, and we continued to press the ‘postponement’ button. Certainly he poses the question in much more raw terms, but since Barack Obama’s times it was clear that the US had decided to focus more on the Pacific, and they asked Europe to do more for its defense. Should they help 450 million Europeans to defend themselves against 144 million Russians? “
“The geopolitical environment is changing and our citizens expect from us that we do the main thing that politics is called to do: protect the physical security of our citizens. Also from a military point of view. And therefore increase our military skills will also help us to strengthen the transatlantic alliance, but we must have a real European pillar of NATO, and then it will also be in the interest of the Americans being allied with us, because we will be a much more powerful ally”. In short, for the SPD member “we should first order our house”.
Order at home
And Merz, and his coalition of the CDU conservatives and the SPD Social Democrats, will have to order especially in Germany, with the far right of the AFD that grows more and more in the consents.
In this sense, what will be important to do will be “to obtain results”, and Cremer says he is convinced that the new government “will deal more with policies than politics”, which will be more concrete, and the first thing he will do will be “investing in our infrastructures. Investing to repair the roof of our home, and this will help put the national economy again”. And to stop the spread of the radical right, you have to do the same in its opinion: to obtain results.
“It is useless that we continue to reiterate how dangerous the AFD is. Because it is, it is clear, but we will not beat it so. We will beat it by showing that it does not have a real plan for Germany, and we will beat it by showing that we have it. To know how to make our economy and our democracy work. And when citizens will see it, they will reassure and stop addressing them”.
