LOC12:14
09:14 GMT
BERLIN, July 26 (KUNA) -- The floods that swept the western German states a few days ago surprised not only the residents of the affected areas and public opinion, but also the German parties that are preparing for elections.
The massive devastation and the large number of victims caused the political elites and the media to start searching for the causes of the disaster and placing the environmental protection file at the forefront of the electoral issues.
Several candidates of the three major parties rushed to suspend their summer holidays and headed to the afflicted areas to show solidarity with citizens.
The German candidates of the three major parties are aware of the importance of natural disasters in diverting the attention of voters, and affecting the popularity of parties in opinion polls, and perhaps even in resolving these elections in favor of one party at the expense of another, as happened in the 2002 elections when the floods in eastern and northern Germany surprised the German parties in the midst of the election.
In 2002, the results of the elections held on September 22, a month after the floods, showed how the Social Democrats led by Schroeder managed to raise their popularity and obtain 38.5 percent of the vote, which qualified them to form a government led by Schroeder in an alliance with the Green Party led by former Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer.
Since then, the term "rubber boots policy" has appeared in the dictionary of German parties, in reference to the appearance of politicians in flood areas wearing rubber boots.
Moreover, monitoring the conditions of citizens, closely, during natural disasters also applies to the current German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who was personally present at the devastating floods areas that swept southern Germany in 2013, specifically the Bavaria state, which is an important stronghold for German conservatives.
In 2013 elections, conservative Angela Merkel managed to resolve the elections in favor of her Christian Democratic Party, which later formed a broad coalition with the Social Democrats.
Based on similar cases, observers have a question about whether the elections scheduled for the end of next September will witness similar scenario.
In this regard, an expert in German internal political affairs, Ewald Koenig, told KUNA that the immediate presence of the Christian Democrat candidate Armin Laschet, in devastated areas "is undoubtedly credited to him adding that it is necessary here, "to differentiate between two levels, the first relates to the ability to provide immediate aid, and the second relates to creating and presenting plans through which similar crises can be avoided in the future."
Koenig added that Laschet "will be able to achieve successes on the first level because his position as head of the government of the affected state North Rhine-Westphalia allows him to make decisions to provide immediate aid," noting, "But on the second level, it seems to me that the Green Party, as an environmental party, has the best policy in terms of providing future solutions to address natural disasters.
And whether this disaster will change the course of the electoral campaign, the political researcher added that the loss of more than 100 lives in these floods "will be a reason to put the environmental protection file at the forefront of the electoral files," adding, "Noting that the Coronavirus pandemic will remain one of the most prominent topics that will affect the voters.
Koenig added that candidate of the Social Democrats and German Vice Chancellor Olaf Schulz visit to the disaster areas on behalf of Angela Merkel, who was during the floods on a visit to Washington, gave the visit a governmental character not an electoral character.
The German expert explained that the voter at the end "will not be interested in the appearance of politicians in affected areas, but to provide immediate aid to the affected people and compensate them," stressing that the majority of voters are concerned about their own interests, not in their ideological convictions, at a time when the electoral programs of the different parties are close to each other. (end)
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