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Once Defiant European Leaders Now Face Public Wrath

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  • Once Defiant European Leaders Now Face Public Wrath

    French, German leaders face uphill battle for EU constitution

    BY TOD ROBBERSON

    The Dallas Morning News

    LONDON - (KRT) - They were hugely popular for defying President Bush and opposing the 2003 invasion of Iraq, but now the leaders of France and Germany are struggling for political survival as voters turn against them in droves.

    In France on Sunday, President Jacques Chirac and Prime Minister Pierre Raffarin will face a test of their own political strength as the nation decides whether to accept a proposed constitution uniting the 25 member-states of the European Union.

    Pre-election polls indicate that voters will reject it by narrow margin - not necessarily because they're against European unity but because they want to punish their leaders. In a recent poll, Raffarin's approval ratings had dropped to 24 percent, while Chirac had only 39 percent support.

    In Germany last Sunday, voters in the nation's largest state, North Rhine-Westphalia, ousted the government ruled for the past 39 years by Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder's Social Democratic Party. The vote upset the balance of power in the national legislature, and Schroeder said he would call early national elections this fall.

    The political upheaval is rooted in the economic recession and double-digit unemployment rates dogging many European governments. But voter dissatisfaction over mainly domestic issues comes at the worst possible time for the European Union, whose ability to integrate laws, unify social and economic policies - and avert future wars - is now being decided by those same disgruntled voters.

    "The integration of Europe is one of the most revolutionary developments of the modern era," said Charles Kupchan, director of European studies at the Council on Foreign Relations. "Even though, to the eye, one sees this a political and economic integration, this is really a revolutionary exercise in geopolitical engineering: mending together separate national states so that they will never again go after each other."

    A "no" vote in France is widely viewed as setting the tone for other referendums elsewhere in Europe, including one in the Netherlands on Wednesday and another in Britain later this year.

    Polls in both countries indicate voters oppose the EU constitution but could be swayed by a "yes" victory in France. In effect, a French rejection could deal a deathblow to the constitution, whose approval is required by all 25 member states. However, the EU would remain intact as a trade entity.

    Columnist Timothy Garton Ash, writing in Britain's Guardian newspaper, said France's referendum marks a turning point in Europe's postwar history.

    "Not since May 1940 has the rest of Europe looked with such attention and trepidation at what is happening in France. Sixty-five years ago, it was the future of a Europe at war that depended on the French. Now, it's the future of a Europe at peace," Ash wrote.

    The chance that the constitution could be rejected in France, one of the "founding fathers" of European integration, "will send shockwaves throughout Europe," Kupchan said. But voter perceptions in France, Britain and the Netherlands have had little or anything to do with the constitution itself.

    "The way I would put the question is: Is the EU constitution playing any role at all?" he said. "This is about the ill political wind currently blowing across Europe" due almost entirely to an anti-incumbent mood sweeping the continent.

    Even Chirac acknowledged in campaigning this week that voters might be confusing the referendum on the leadership.

    "We must not mistake the question," he said. "It is not about saying yes or no to the government. It is about your future and that of your children, of the future of France and the future of Europe."

    Some politicians have suggested the "no" vote might actually be gaining steam as a result of the government's campaign for the constitution's approval.

    Jack Lang, the former minister of culture and education, was quoted in the European press as urging Raffarin to "go into hiding" until after the vote. "Let's be honest. Every time you make an appearance, we lose two percentage points," he said.

    There has been some debate over European unity, but it has largely focused on Europe's relaxed labor and immigration rules, which workers blame for rising unemployment, political analysts said.

    It is dubbed the "Polish plumber" syndrome: Large numbers of workers from the EU's newest member states in eastern Europe are increasingly free to migrate to western Europe. Native workers blame their unemployment on the migrants, who work for much lower pay.

    In Germany, Schroeder's sagging political fortunes are linked closely to his inability to tackle the skyrocketing immigration rates of workers from Turkey - which is seeking EU membership - at a time when German unemployment hovers at 10.5 percent.

    Germany's legislature approved the constitution Friday, rather than putting it to a referendum. In the final legislative hurdle, the upper house overwhelmingly approved the treaty, a vote Schroeder hopes will boost support for the constitution ahead of Sunday's referendum in France.

    "The enthusiasm for union is declining all the time," a senior German official said, blaming last year's addition of 10 new states for the growing anti-EU feeling in Germany. He said a "no" vote in France likely would stall any future plans to expand EU membership, particularly if it included Turkey.

    Richard Whitman, director of the European Project at the Royal Institute for International Affairs in London, said the irony of France's vote is that few people there or elsewhere in Europe can identify specifically what they don't like about the idea of European unity.

    Rather, he said, the EU vote "has become a lightning rod for discontent" about other, largely unrelated issues. A French rejection will not mean the end of the European Union, he said, but it could badly affect the morale of the EU's leadership.

    The EU now faces the prospect of having its two leading states - France and Germany - distancing themselves from the very body they co-founded, Whitman said.

    If the domestic backlash causes them to step back from their leadership role, he said, "Who will have the energy and imagination to take over? Who's going to pick up the baton?"

    http://www.kansascity.com/mld/kansas...d/11757481.htm

  • #2
    Revenge is a dish best served cold.

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