Berlin Just 30 minutes after the deadline for applicants for the CDU party chairmanship has expired, Friedrich Merz and his supporters of the economic wing open their election campaign – together with Armin Laschet. The outgoing party leader will award the SME Prize of the Business and SME Association (MIT) this Wednesday evening at 6.30 p.m. This year it goes to Hans-Joachim Watzke, Managing Director of Borussia Dortmund and Intimus von Merz, who may be the next CDU chairman.
But the stage belongs to someone else: Carsten Linnemann. The MIT boss will not only greet the guests and guide them through the evening. He’s also saying goodbye to take the next step on the corporate ladder.
Linnemann announced on Tuesday in the MIT Presidium that he would be resigning from his position. He should not only play a central role in the Merz team. The 44-year-old economist is already considered his potential successor, as long as the members appoint Merz as the new chairman – and everything then goes according to plan.
Superficially, his departure from MIT has to do with the fact that he is an advocate of term limits and that he is consistently living this with his decision. But above all, Linnemann should be something like the first deputy party chairman in a Merz CDU – and as a vice also head of the basic program commission.
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The task is one of the most important of the party, especially when it comes to reorienting the party, as it was last in the 1970s or after German unification. In addition, according to the plan, Linnemann should get his own office in the party headquarters. Staff are also part of it to coordinate the working groups and events that should be part of the process. “Modern conservatives want to shape progress and new developments,” Linnemann had already declared in February.
For Linnemann, Spahn would have to leave the CDU leadership
The Paderborn resident has already taken over a dusty shop: MIT. Since 2013 he has modernized the association, in terms of content, personnel and also with new, hip rooms and developed it into an important contact person both internally and externally. It is his letter of recommendation for the role he is supposed to play at Merz.
If he proves himself, then all doors should be open to him. But the role of the head of a party wing is not compatible with the new task. It is true that he is considered a diplomat who also makes compromises with the workers’ wing in order to achieve his goals. But in future he should be accessible to everyone. The Junge Union is definitely one of his supporters.
Linnemann, the son of a bookseller family, was urged by many to even run for party chairmanship. He struggled with himself, as he did in 2013 when he ran for the MIT chairmanship. Fear of defeat and respect for the task made him hesitate. Jens Spahn encouraged him at the time. The bond holds to this day, even if Spahn now has to give way in the CDU leadership. There is no room for three from North Rhine-Westphalia in the tour. Above all, Linnemann has far more supporters, which encouraged him to meet up with Merz.
Accordingly, it has long been considered an option that Linnemann could follow Merz if he should withdraw after a successful modernization of the party. Merz himself names the repositioning in the next two years as a central task – and not the question of who could become chancellor candidate in 2025.
Skepticism among the workers’ wing
However, there is skepticism among the workers’ wing, as Merz, like Linnemann, undoubtedly belong to the economic wing of the party – even if Merz selected the former Social Senator of Berlin as general secretary with Mario Czaja in his third candidacy for the party chairmanship and emphasized the deficits of the CDU in social policy.
“We do not need a conservative alternative to the FDP,” said the vice-head of the Christian Democratic Workers’ Union (CDA), Dennis Radtke, the Handelsblatt. The CDU lost 2.5 million votes to the SPD and the Greens in the federal election because the party did not provide any answers to pressing social issues.
He was “amazed and pleased” to hear that Merz had recognized the problem in social policy. “I take note of that,” said the MEP from Wattenscheid. The decisive factor, however, is “to be specific in order to sharpen the socio-political profile”.
Merz will have to respond to the social wing in order to first win the election and then to unite the party. On the other hand, the SME Union will have to be set up accordingly in the coming years. In conversation as Linnemann’s successor is the Brandenburg member of the Bundestag Jana Schimke. The 42-year-old mother of two told the Handelsblatt that there were “big footsteps that Carsten is leaving behind. It’s about maintaining the standard and strengthening the CDU’s economic and political profile. “
As with the election of the CDU chairman, there will also be a two-week nomination process for candidates at MIT. This is followed by a short round of introductions before the MIT SME Conference in Dresden elects a new federal board.
More: CDU chairmanship: The Merz camp opens the election campaign.