Poll Outcome Takes Media By Surprise

Angela Merkel's Christian Democratic Union and its Bavarian sister party, the Christian Social Union, scored 35.2 percent of the votes (38.5 percent in 2002) to 34.3 percent for the Social Democrats (also 38.5 percent in 2002) in Sunday's vote, according to provisional results from the electoral commission announced early Monday.

If those results are confirmed, Merkel's party will secure three more seats than Schröder's but remain well short of an overall parliamentary majority, leaving both sides scrambling to form a coalition government.

DW-WORLD caught up with some foreign correspondents for reaction to the poll results.

Tom Goeller from the conservative Washington Times in the US:

"The election outcome is a surprise. I expected Black-yellow (the conservative alliance of Christian Democrats and Christian Social Union and the free-market liberal FDP) to win, I thought there would be a change. Instead, now there's a majority on the left. That shows that Schröder managed to create fear among the people. In Germany, the word 'fear' appears everyday in the headlines of the one of the big papers. The Germans are always scared -- that the Brandenburg Gate will be detonated, they have to pay more. Three years ago it was Iraq that the Germans had nothing to do with. This time it's a mixture of a really bad campaign by the CDU (Christian Democrats) and a skilful counterattack by the SPD. Schröder and the Germans have a love affair. What Schröder tells them seldom has anything to do with reality. Schröder is a new Shakespeare: "As you like it."

Roger Boyes, correspondent of the British daily The Times:

"The situation is absolutely confusing. That's a direct consequence of the Germans' fear that they must pay for the price of radical reforms. They elected the lesser evil. Better to have Schröder than Kirchhoff (Merkel's controversial shadow finance minister), is what they thought. He (Kirchhoff) stood at the forefront, Merkel was in the background. Even if Merkel does become chancellor herself, it's a disastrous result."

Antoine Jacob, Germany correspondent for French daily, Le Monde:

"I'm as surprised about the result as the party representatives who I just spoke to. It reminds me of the Fourth Republic in France (from 1946 to 1956): then too, nobody knew on election evening who would rule. If a grand coalition does emerge, it will bear a similarity to the cohabitation between center-left Premier Jospin and the center-right President Chirac (1997 to 2002). I believe that German Chancellor Gerhard Schröder, much like the former Chancellor Schmidt, is closer to the free-market liberal FDP than to the left of center."

"A debacle for the conservatives"

Meanwhile, initial opinions in German newspapers said that German voters have delivered a severe blow to conservative leader Angela Merkel at the polls, despite the fact that her Christian Democratic Union emerged as the

biggest party in the general election.

"This result is a debacle for the Christian Unions and their candidate for chancellor," the conservative Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung commented.

"Nobody thought that the Christian Democrats would be so far from their 2002 results," the paper continued.

Merkel, the "woman of the east," won fewer votes than Schröder's losing rival, Edmund Stoiber, in 2002, the mass-circulation Bild recalled.

"Merkel has won and lost at the same time," the paper said, speaking of a "bitter blow" to her aspirations to become Germany's first woman chancellor.

Eastern Germany punished a candidate for the chancellorship who grew up in a Communist bloc state, argued the regional daily Leipziger Volkszeitung, based in the former East Germany where Merkel was raised.

As a result of the unexpectedly poor showing of the CDU-CSU, which had been credited with more than 40 percent support in pre-election polls, "Merkel's personal future is uncertain," wrote the Westdeutsche Allgemeine Zeitung, the second-largest Germany daily.

"A turbulent week lies ahead for the CDU, during which almost everything will be under review, including a replacement for Merkel," it added.

In the eyes of Die Welt, Merkel "will have to battle to achieve what she had expected to win" and "there will be many who use her as a scapegoat."

Due to the very close vote result it will be difficult for her to form a government, opening the way for fresh elections, the centre-left Frankfurter Rundschau said.

"One could legitimately ask whether a government formed in such uncertain conditions could last four years."