German CDU proposes equal cabinet share

German conservatives want a post-election deal under which their leader Angela Merkel becomes chancellor and they share half the posts in a 16-member cabinet with the Social Democrats, media reports said yesterday.

Details of the proposed agreement between Merkel's Christian Democrats (CDU) and Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder's Social Democrats (SPD) after last month's inconclusive election appeared in the weekly magazine Focus, which cited CDU sources.

The SPD would take eight ministerial posts in a power-sharing government, the CDU four and its smaller Bavarian sister party, the CSU, two, the unidentified CDU sources were quoted as saying.

Merkel and CDU General Secretary Volker Kauder in a new cabinet post as chancellery minister would make up the CDU/CSU contingent, Focus said.

The conservative weekly Welt am Sonntag said the proposed deal stipulated that Merkel, whose conservatives won just four more seats than the SPD in last month's election, would replace Schroeder as chancellor.

An equal number of people from each of the two political groupings would be around the cabinet table, it added, citing party sources it did not identify.

SPD and CDU spokesmen both declined to comment on the reports and noted that Merkel, CSU head Edmund Stoiber, Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder and SPD chief Franz Muentefering had agreed not to reveal details of the talks before they end.

The four are due to meet again this evening in Berlin and a deal is expected to be announced either later tonight or early tomorrow after party executives have been informed.

An accord would pave the way for full coalition talks and help resolve the stalemate that has halted major government activity since the September parliamentary elections.