Berlin:
Germany’s conservative candidate to succeed Angela Merkel as chancellor apologised on Sunday for laughing on a stop by to a flood-stricken town last week, a gaffe that has hit his ratings two months just before a federal election.
Armin Laschet’s conservative bloc is about 10 points ahead of the Greens in most polls, but his lapse last weekend at Erftstadt, when he was caught on camera laughing at a joke even though the country’s president was providing a sombre speech, has expense him.
“It was stupid and shouldn’t have happened and I regret it,” he told ZDF tv. “I am sorry, I can’t say much more.”
The incident spawned a twitter storm below the hashtag “laschetlacht” (Laschet laughs). An INSA poll on Sunday showed that 57% of Germans viewed Laschet’s actions in the catastrophic floods, which killed at least 180 people today, as unfavorable.
In a direct vote for chancellor, Laschet would only get 15%, down 5 points from last week, compared with 21% for his Social Democrat rival, Olaf Scholz, the poll showed.
In a wide-ranging interview with ZDF tv, Laschet mentioned he was determined to shift the campaign for the Sept. 26 election on to challenges such as the economy and climate alter.
“It is understandable that polls will fluctuate in a difficult week but in the next few weeks I want to shape the discussion on issues,” he told ZDF.
Playing down variations with his Bavarian conservative rival, Markus Soeder, who has pushed for more ambitious climate targets, Laschet mentioned he believed Germany would have phased out its coal just before the target date of 2038.
“We should stick to the plan. But I think we will exit it more quickly than we all think due to CO2 prices,” he mentioned.
He also mentioned he was not at odds on tax with Soeder, whose CSU types a parliamentary bloc with Laschet’s larger CDU. Popular Soeder lost a bid to grow to be the conservative chancellor candidate thanks to vested CDU interests in Laschet.
“In tax we are very close,” mentioned Laschet, when asked about Soeder’s calls for tax reductions.
Making clear that his priority was not cutting taxes, Laschet mentioned the conservatives wanted steady state finances and that to guarantee blanket cuts was “not serious”.
Saying significant investment was necessary for Europe’s greatest economy to recover from the COVID-19 crisis, he pointed out that Germany was bound by strict guidelines limiting new debt which are enshrined in the constitution.
“If there is the financial scope, we will support reducing the burden on low- and medium-earners and that should happen for families by 2023,” mentioned Laschet.
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