{"id":9143,"date":"2012-03-21T03:21:43","date_gmt":"2012-03-21T01:21:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/03\/merkel-faces-rout-in-key-state-as-ally-hedges-bets\/"},"modified":"2012-03-21T03:21:43","modified_gmt":"2012-03-21T01:21:43","slug":"merkel-faces-rout-in-key-state-as-ally-hedges-bets","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/merkel-faces-rout-in-key-state-as-ally-hedges-bets\/","title":{"rendered":"Merkel faces rout in key state as ally hedges bets"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\t\t<span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>* Snap vote in North Rhine-Westphalia gives Merkel headache<span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>* Minister ignores Merkel&#8217;s demand he focus on state battle<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>* Roettgen refuses to give up cabinet job for state run<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>By Erik Kirschbaum<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>BERLIN, March 20 (Reuters) &#8211; Chancellor Angela Merkel&#8217;s<br \/>\nconservatives risk a bruising defeat in a May election in<br \/>\nGermany&#8217;s most populous state because the man leading her<br \/>\ncampaign there, Environment Minister Norbert Roettgen, refuses<br \/>\nto risk his cabinet post.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Conservative party leaders and coalition allies have<br \/>\npublicly urged Roettgen to give up his cabinet job and commit<br \/>\nhimself to leading Merkel&#8217;s Christian Democrats (CDU) even in<br \/>\nopposition in North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW).<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>The CDU has fallen five points behind the centre-left Social<br \/>\nDemocrats and may drop further due to disenchantment over<br \/>\nRoettgen&#8217;s pointed reluctance to stay in the state if he loses.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Merkel pleaded with Roettgen at the weekend to commit<br \/>\nhimself wholeheartedly but the fresh-faced lawyer, who harbours<br \/>\nambitions to become chancellor one day, rebuffed her. A rout in<br \/>\nthe state would damage Merkel ahead of her 2013 re-election<br \/>\ncampaign.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>The state, the country&#8217;s biggest electoral prize and home to<br \/>\none in six voters, is a microcosm of Germany. Changes in<br \/>\ncoalitions there have been harbingers of change for national<br \/>\ngovernments &#8211; most recently in 2005, when the CDU led a<br \/>\ncentre-right coalition to power there four months before Merkel<br \/>\nwas elected with the same constellation in Berlin.<br \/>\n\u00a0 <span class=\"label\"><strong>Continued&#8230;<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>* Snap vote in North Rhine-Westphalia gives Merkel headache * Minister ignores Merkel&#8217;s demand he focus on state battle * Roettgen refuses to give up cabinet job for state run By Erik Kirschbaum BERLIN, March 20 (Reuters) &#8211; Chancellor Angela Merkel&#8217;s conservatives risk a bruising defeat in a May election in Germany&#8217;s most populous state [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[830,2370,183],"class_list":{"0":"post-9143","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-south-africa","7":"tag-news","8":"tag-reuters","9":"tag-south-africa-2","10":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9143","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9143"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9143\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9143"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9143"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9143"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}