Actually, the man next to Markus Söder should be the focus this Tuesday: Klaus Holetschek. A few minutes ago, the CSU MPs elected him as the new head of the state parliamentary group. But now Holetschek is standing in the hallway in the Maximilianeum and it’s back to Söder and his duel with Free Voters leader Hubert Aiwanger. After the election on Sunday evening, Aiwanger looked “a bit pale”, but had already “gained weight” again on Monday, said Söder at the press conference after the parliamentary group meeting. Having gained self-confidence, you have to understand the Prime Minister, which is why he once again advises his deputy to “reflect”. It’s not “about egos” now.
The fact that Söder and Aiwanger are not concerned with egos is of course a bold thesis. But, yes, it’s about more than a duel between two men. Sometimes you forget that, but behind the men there are also two parties that have to come together again after months in which a lot has gone wrong. On Thursday, the CSU and Free Voters (FW) will meet for the first time to explore a new coalition. There is hope on both sides that things will calm down again once they sit together at the table. However, and this makes things complicated: the hope on both sides is that the other will withdraw.
“A lot happened in the election campaign. Simply ignoring it,” says Söder, “is not enough.” The CSU also has the impression that the FW has moved to the right. “The Free Voters have changed,” says Söder. At the first probe on Thursday, he expects a confession as to whether the FW are “firmly anchored in the democratic spectrum”, where their “location” is “and where the journey is going”. Is that already an ultimatum? In any case, it is interesting that the new parliamentary group leader Holetschek consistently speaks of a “potential” coalition partner. The CSU apparently wants to keep a little threatening backdrop open. Mathematically and very narrowly, a coalition with the SPD would also be possible. According to the CSU, the calculation artists from the FW certainly also noticed this.
It also has to do with the FW that Söder proposed his Health Minister Holetschek for the post of parliamentary group leader on Monday – as the successor to Thomas Kreuzer, who is going into political retirement. In any case, Söder says that Holetschek is not known as the “first chairman of the Circle of Friends of Free Voters.” Which Holetschek then immediately proves when he advises the FW to “take their foot off the gas”. You now have to “sit down at the table, look each other in the eye and speak plainly.”
The CSU did not like the fact that the FW called for an additional ministry immediately after the election and also criticized the work of CSU-run houses. The Christian Socialists cannot even begin to recognize the “eye level” between the two parties, which FW parliamentary group leader Florian Streibl spoke about on Monday. Holetschek says about Economics Minister Aiwanger that he should think about whether his “economic policy of the last five years has worked in detail.”
The group should appear more self-confident again
This is now part of his new job profile as parliamentary group leader: Tackling the coalition partner harder than before, questioning their performance even more, Söder also plans to do that. Quite a few in the CSU thought that Söder had treated the FW too gently for too long. In general, Holetschek wants the group to appear more self-confident again, “it won’t go on like it did in previous years.” His group wants to “form a unit” with Prime Minister Söder and the state government, but we will also contribute to this work independently and confidently. This can be seen as a warning.
Söder, in turn, says he thinks it’s “good” when the group is self-confident and “great” when ideas come from there. Which in turn is to be understood as a tip, since the CSU MPs haven’t exactly attracted attention with fireworks of ideas recently. “There is a new momentum, a new drive that is coming,” says Söder about the new parliamentary group leader and the new parliamentary group, which met for the first time on Tuesday. A total of 29 of the 85 members are new to the state parliament, including some younger members. The election result for Holetschek was clear. There were 84 yes votes and one no. His election is initially valid for two years. He will resign as health minister on Friday. Until a successor is determined, Social Minister Ulrike Scharf (CSU) will take over on an interim basis.
“Everything has its time,” says Holetschek and praises his predecessor Kreuzer for his work. Now he wants to “set his own accents”. The group wants to “develop its own DNA, its own impulse”. They want to make policies that “actually further improve people’s quality of life,” says Holetschek. “That’s my standard. That’s what I’ll be measured against again after two and a half years.”