CHANCELLOR Helmut Kohl's coalition is slipping into bitter infighting as Germany strains to impose the toughest possible conditions for a European single currency for which it has difficulty qualifying itself.
At the centre of several internal disputes stands Finance Minister, Mr Theo Waigel, whose stubborn line on the planned economic and political union (EMU) worries politicians looking ahead to a series of elections next year.
In the coalition, the affable Bavarian is under pressure both to ease off and to tighten up on the Maastricht budget deficit target of 3 per cent of gross domestic product.
The opposition Social Democrats (SPD), whose support will be needed to win parliamentary approval to join the single currently, are toying with the idea of running a Euro sceptical campaign in the general election due in October 1998.
"We have to clear this up soon," said a strategist for Mr Kohl's Christian Democratic Union (CDU).
Mr Waigel has quietly backed off from saying the precise "3 per cent" but insists that this is not a softening of his line.
To prove this, he lashed out at Foreign Minister, Mr Klaus Kinkel, of the Free Democratic Party (FDP), this week for saying EMU's "point of no return" had been passed and that meeting the Maastricht criteria was a "process" rather than a target to be met on a certain day.
Unrest in the Christian Social Union (CSU) was reflected in an even tougher attack on Mr Kinkel by Bavarian state premier Mr Edmund Stoiber, the main rival to CSU chairman, Mr Waigel in the conservative party.
Political analysts see Mr Stoiber's ultra tough line on the euro's stability as part of a Bavarian power struggle that could come to a head at the state elections next year.
Mr Kohl shies away from numbers, preferring to say Bonn will meet the criteria on time and to keep up the pressure on other EU members by making clear he wants to see the project through.
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