Merkel and Westerwelle: 100 days together

In the beginning of February there was 100-day anniversary of a new “black-and-yellow” German government. There is a tradition in Germany, as well as in many other European countries, to strike the first balance after one hundred days. For Merkel-Westerwelle tandem this balance turned out to be more than controversial…
Making summary of ruling coalition’s activity, we may positively say that it failed to achieve any substantially good results. Its popularity falls: according to surveys, currently “the black-and-yellow” could get far less than a half of votes. Is it a good chance for opposition?
Representatives of social democrats – the largest oppositional party – are quite optimistic. “We shall force the government to play our rules” – stated Hans-Peter Bartels, member of Bundestag. As an example he mentioned Merkel’s decision to buy from a private individual the data about FRG citizens who use “grey schemes” to avoid taxes using Swiss banks, actively supported by his party. However, this optimism is not capable of compensating the fact that Social Democratic Party of Germany suffered a total defeat during the autumn elections. Social democrats have actually only one chance to come to power in the nearest future – to make alliance with the two other oppositional parties represented in the parliament.
http://www.eastwest-review.com/article/merkel-and-westerwelle-100-days-together