GERMANY: Berlin is facing growing pressure to ratify the European constitution in a country-wide referendum, the first such vote in Germany's post-war history, writes Derek Scally in Berlin.
Chancellor Gerhard Schröder has insisted that the constitutional treaty will be ratified, like all EU treaties, by the two houses of parliament. But a poll by the Forsa agency shows that four out of five Germans want their say, and the chancellor faces increasing calls from the opposition and from within his own Social Democratic Party (SPD) to join the nine other EU member-states putting the treaty to a vote.
Leading SPD members, including parliamentary leader Mr Wolfgang Thierse, support the referendum call, as does the leader of the Green Party, the liberal Free Democrats (FDP) and Mr Edmund Stoiber, Bavaria's conservative prime minister.
"When the British, the French, the Spanish, the Portuguese and many others vote on the EU treaty, the Germans cannot be left out," said Mr Stoiber.
However, Mr Schröder's refusal to hold a referendum has the backing of the leader of the opposition Christian Democrats (CDU), Dr Angela Merkel, and the Green Party Foreign Minister, Mr Joschka Fischer.
"I am in agreement with the chancellor. We should ratify the treaty very quickly and get a head start," said Mr Fischer on German television yesterday.
Mr Schröder wants Germany to be one of the first countries to ratify the treaty, perhaps as soon as December, as an example to other countries.
A government spokesman said yesterday the treaty could not be ratified by referendum because such votes at federal level are not permitted by the German constitution.
Referendums have been viewed with suspicion by all post-war chancellors.
When asked why there was no referendum on Germany adopting the euro, former chancellor Dr Helmut Kohl famously replied: "Because we wouldn't have got the result we wanted."
A leading SPD politician echoed his remarks yesterday in Der Spiegel magazine: "Sometimes the people have to be protected from wrong decisions. But the pressure [for an EU referendum] will grow."
Mr Schröder fears it could be used by voters to punish his ruling SPD, currently languishing at 20 per cent in the polls.
Government sources say Mr Schröder will propose changing the constitution in the new parliamentary term to allow referendums in principle, and only then examine whether an EU referendum is necessary.