this is news coming to you live from berlin is this the beginning of the end of the machall era germany's childers says she will not seek reelection at the end. i have a clear sense that the time has come to open a new chapter but as the chancellor and the chair of the christian democrats i do think you're going to see can also be for bear responsibility the buck stops here oh for the successes and failures. so michael will also resigned as head of a conservative party open the door for potential successors disastrous returns for

a coalition in a pair of regional elections appear to have pushed metal towards the exits after more than a decade in power. hello and welcome i'm i'm with that shima now let's. bring you some breaking news from germany if you're just joining us off to dominating german politics for a decade is the beginning of the end for chancellor angela merkel she has just told a news conference at the headquarters of a christian democratic party that she's to leave her post at the helm of the party before the end of the year and that she quit the post of german chancellor at the end of this bottom entry which just sets to iran did to pass them and twenty one american made the announcement following two disastrous state performances in. the tubes in bavaria. this month and on sunday in the state of.

their son will live to a political correspondent on the sparrow he is standing by at the christian democratic party headquarters and he's just been listening to chancellor angela merkel thomas a welcome to tell us and give us a brief summary a recap of what chancellor angela merkel had to say and why she decided to take this step now. i'm greta they have been many indications in the past that i'm going to call could be slowly but surely coming to the end of her career as german chancellor but this seems to be at least the most evident one from angela merkel herself at her own party headquarters with a very clear message saying not only that she will stand. as a reelection party chair in the party conference in december but that she will not be a candidate again or german chancellor after her current in office and i'm going to

call is not a chance that has been known so far for giving such clear statements like the one that we have heard just now this really seemed to me a very clear well planned and structured statement by the chancellor where she mentioned that it was time for a new chapter that it was time for her to give space and room for the party to think about the future both her and. i mentioned that it was a turning point to that well those were the words that they used and indeed to seems like a turning point what angela merkel had to say today right here at a party conference in berlin at a party conference headquarters in berlin so don't assume what you're saying this was a carefully calculated choreographed move by the chancellor and not some panicked reaction to the results of two regional elections what are people there saying to you about it meccas decisions and the announcements that she just made. well if you if you talk to senior conservatives here they most of them at least say that they

welcome the decision by angela merkel that it is a decision that is respected it's a decision that again will open the opportunity for the party to restructure itself for the party to think about the future as i just mentioned so that is something that you hear from leading conservatives right here at the party headquarters something else that we've heard is that the. discussions now becoming much more open about the future whereas previously those discussions were not taking place at least openly they may have taken place privately but at least not openly you would rarely hear someone talk about a possible merkel successor now those discussions are being carried out much more openly and that's often something else but i'm glad merkel mentioned today when she spoke about that room for her party to restructure and think about what comes next but i don't aspire at the c.d.u. had quotas thank you very much for that a live update. and the similar analysis to have with me athena political

correspondent peter craven in the studio welcome peter so we heard what it thomas had to say what do you make a what chancellor angela merkel said and do you think she's a much stronger. after these announcements that she made at a party headquarters what i think the third the first thing to point out is that there was an element of pragmatism in the decision that she'd make she just feels that they these two days defeats the c.d.u. party has suffered and has known to be very in the last two weeks to that too sensitive and don't bode well for the future at all but she also expressed some still some strong emotions she didn't talk directly about horse a hole for her rival from the very and c.s.u. the the bavarian wing of her conservatives who's been there they've been involved in a quarrel which many believe that whole see hope for is really pushed in the last couple of weeks that have been disastrous for the government has been disastrous for the c.d.u. and has been as we saw yesterday evening and i think i'm going to america has been mightily mightily by that and i think she expressed that as far as she would go as regards whether she's any stronger or weaker that will remain to be seen because it

really is going to depend on who the candidates are going to be will really have a couple of names to conjure with who the candidates are going to be and who's going to win this votes in december to see who the next cd chairperson is going to be if it is either of three so young who are on the. national of a stright of a patriotic rights of the business friend. the right not the liberal moderate wing of the of the c.d.u. then i can't see them having anything but a tough time together really especially for the dish mess there was he and i'm going to medical go back an awful long way she fired him two thousand and two from the position of. the parliamentary group leader and he viewed that as a humiliation and i think it's probably a grudge that's a little bit like course a hole for his carried with him through the many years that they have been working together because he what he left politics but is now back in a big way obviously of course they're not part of this is seven overdrive was just waiting for the opportunity to strike this is the problem you've been in office for

so long and seen so many madden all thirty they've been sitting there seething for all these long is it may seem one of the things she also said that she would not be sending a foot chancellor for not a term that is not they surprising most people expected or not to stand for a fifth term but she's also said she's not standing for the post of sham and how significant is that it is interesting is fascinating because she has always said she has her own best wisdom tells her that you need both offices you need to be the chancellor and you need to be the chairman of your own party so that you have them in balance so they have them working in a coordinated way together she gave an example here where she said in her speech just now she said if you go to brussels and you go and negotiate a deal you need to know that you can come back to germany get a majority for that deal that you have your party behind you that you have your government behind you if you don't you're in trouble and so for herself she put herself in a position that she never wanted to begin and it will be interesting to see how

that works out also for her successor whoever that is going to be is that person going to sit next to or not have both both elements of power to say it's a play within to be able to rely on or is that person going to try to push angela merkel out of office or in due course you know the implications of this a fascinating one of the things she kept stressing is that he. taking this decision she said as far back as during the summer retreat of hope potty and yet she kept quiet did not seem to be the same as i don't know exactly what it was but between times and she admits it so much that she came out and said no she was going to keep both offices together and not them don't you know cut away from one of them and just keep to keep the other one and she was asked by one of the journalists was the answer was not a sort of a white lie of some sort she admitted that she tried to sort of frame it so it didn't sound like an untruth but it had elements of untruth about it maci did talk about the fact that the full image of the government had been badly damaged with

all of this infighting it within the conservative block you mentioned her interior minister course a whore for then also with the grand coalition as the center left social democrats and this she felt was distracting from the actual work that needed to be done in government and she hoped that a step would at that and work that has been done that has been legislation introduced to parliament some some of it you know. conservative. sympathizers would say he's good legislation but it has been obscured it has been ignored because of the court ruling that's been going on and yes that has had an incredibly damaging impact we saw it in has and we saw it in bavaria we saw it with the with the same conservative slumping from twenty fifteen forty percent to now twenty five percent and the question is this whole operation now as it seems to be emerging the whole purpose of this seems to be to slow down any kind of snowball avalanche effect to the detriment of the conservative but whether it's going to have that impact on that that remains to be seen so we still don't know what's going to happen the long

term and really it will depend as you said a lot what happens at the party conference at the c.d.u. in december but in the medium to do you think this is taking a bit of the pressure off that the us is talking about recognizing the problems that the government is facing and taking responsibility for it is that i'm just sponsible the buck stops with me and i'm taking a step which hopefully will ease the situation the running of the government a new stone. that was the term they used a couple of times this is going to be a new start but you can talk about new styles it doesn't mean that they've newly started it means that you've got to get down to work and actually do it and it you know the prospects of as i say of three just met so young spawn working together with angular merkel closely in office. is. something to come to with him is going to be very interesting to see what happens if there was one of the reporters who are off to you know what is that does say that you will not be a lame duck shunts let me use the stem a bit loosely but in the sense that you've lost one major pillar of support as

party leader. is that a danger of that. if she once again young spawn fritters mattson angle americal either of those combinations is in my estimation not going to work on the grass come combo or possibly as the tunde i'm in office now to support you know that that is something that is much more likely to in pragmatic terms work but whether. it comes as a pragmatic middle of the road. woman in angle americans mold is going to get elected by the christian democrats who are in a mood is much more sort of swinging towards a conservative nationalist so you know i don't think that's likely to go i thought i'd be very surprised if on a program carbo wins this wins this race ok so before we continue our conversation peter let's take another look at some of what i love america had to set up party headquarters is a short while ago three in december at the studio party congress i will not be

running again as chair of a c.d.'s secondly this fourth parliamentary term will be my last parliamentary term as chancellor of germany in a national election twenty twenty one i will not be running as a candidate for this edu again and i will also not be running as a candidate for the lower house upon in the bundestag and i'd also like to note i will not be taking on any other political positions either thirdly for the rest of this parliamentary term i'm prepared to continue to serve as chancellor and fourthly god yes that means that to a large extent i am turning away from what i've always said which is that i believe that the chair of the party and the chancellorship should go together yes this is a bit of a risk but i believe having weighed things up very carefully it is. a risk that any i ought to take and want to take and if i wanted to run.

as chancellor again then i wouldn't have taken this decision. ok so that was unlimited given the list of points that she announced at a party headquarters of the c.d.u. in london just a short while ago and this thing took that with me is that basically of no senior political editor so what what is your reaction to what she said then four points and she made a fifth one which we didn't have a lot on my main reaction was somebody to watch it listening to her talking about this of this. phenomena that we're being told now that she's are now actually going to only be german chancellor or not they had a very own party i thought she was putting a very very brave face on that that you know she said it's risky but i'm prepared to go. i mean she must be thinking back to the days when she was very junior minister and helmut kohl as one of the macos coalition governments and she was watching how he operated and he wasn't a smooth operator but he was an effective operator and that was the that was the

coal system of course there who he was in charge of his party was in charge of government and he was the chancellor. and it all fitted together it was a very tight ship and at least until the you know the last three years and i'm going to michael looks on there and learned lessons for better or worse and said if that if you know she was already a very ambitious young politician if i become german chancellor that's pretty much the way i'm going to be doing is now she is compromising on that and that was her you know very much the sort of the wisdom of the core of her political approach and here she's moving away from it big risk and being forced to move away from him she was a minister and tickle it if it's in one thousand nine hundred one and then as you said when she learned her lesson when the head was going to get a towering figure in german punches then let's now go and find out a little bit more but what the other party in the grand coalition is making of these developments in that is the f b d l ok the s.p.d. a bank is just starting its press conference that let's go live to the s.p.d.

headquarters and take a listen to how they're reacting to these latest developments to do a chance to america. again there is it so how come i love of course he said this morning we congratulated the tour sometimes after vikas morning for the efforts that he put into his election mean that he spoke once again and gave us a very impressive speech about his election campaign and his analysis of the elections and in the body committee we talked about this to point out and say lection campaigns in this state of the s.p.d. and the status of the german government it was a very frank discussion a very intense discussion and by and obviously this discussion isn't over yet we've all done it but i'm going to have executive committee meeting this weekend where we'll be debating these issues at length so it's a few and obviously there are plenty of discussions that need to be had to call in .