GERMANY: The leaders of Germany's Christian Democrats (CDU) and Social Democrats (SPD) will begin talks next Monday on forming a coalition with CDU leader Angela Merkel as the first woman chancellor in history.
However, both Dr Merkel and SPD leader Franz Müntefering were facing revolt last night from backbenchers that the agreement to talks had come at too high a price. One leading SPD politician said SPD backbenchers were "simply horrified" that Mr Müntefering had apparently agreed to sacrifice Chancellor Gerhard Schröder as the price for remaining in power.
Meanwhile, CDU backbenchers are worried that giving the SPD eight cabinet seats, including the key portfolios of finance, foreign affairs and justice, is too high a price to sideline Mr Schröder.
"We are standing at a decisive fork in the road," Dr Merkel said in a remark intended as much for her own backbenchers as for the press. "I am happy but I know that a lot of hard work lies ahead of us. It will be fun to define the political agenda for a change."
The CDU finished last month's general election just four parliamentary seats ahead of the SPD. But Mr Schröder refused to stand down, saying that although his government had been voted out, the CDU had not received a mandate to govern with its preferred coalition partner, the liberal Free Democrats (FDP).
After other three-party coalition permutations went up in smoke, the CDU and SPD met for three rounds of exploratory "talks about talks".
Now the two parties have agreed to begin coalition negotiations next Monday, with the aim of reaching agreement in a month's time. Finding a compromise will be difficult for two parties with drastically different political philosophies and policies. Mr Müntefering warned that his party will wring tough compromises on a "taboo list" which includes employee labour laws.
He made a point yesterday of declining to discuss the political future of Mr Schröder.
Asked why Ms Merkel was a qualified successor to Mr Schröder, he remarked drily: "She's the head of the CDU, that's for them to explain."
No future ministers have been named, except for the Bavarian premier Edmund Stoiber, head of the CDU's sister party the Christian Social Union (CSU), who is in line to become the new economics minister.
Former CDU leader Wolfgang Schäuble is likely to return to the interior ministry, where he once served under chancellor Helmut Kohl.
The CDU will also appoint ministers for defence, education, family and agriculture.
Many former SPD ministers are likely to stay on either in the same or new posts, with the party appointing ministers for foreign affairs, finance, labour, justice, health, development, environment and transport.
"The SPD is responsible for all of Germany's problems, the CDU for Germany's future," complained Johannes Kahrs, spokesman for the influential right wing of the SPD.
Political analysts suggested that expectations for what a grand coalition can achieve will sink as negotiations begin.
"Germans have got what they wanted - standstill. I cannot see any innovation that can result from a grand coalition," said Dr Ralf Altenhof, political scientist at the University of Chemnitz.