German opposition leader rejects idea of gender partiy in government

Germany's conservative opposition leader criticized the government's efforts to promote women into ministerial jobs, claiming it had led to incompetent women in positions of power.

Friedrich Merz, who heads the centre-right Christian Democrats (CDU), said in an interview with broadcaster ntv on Wednesday that he would abandon efforts to achieve gender parity in Germany's Cabinet if he becomes chancellor after next year's national elections.

"Things went so wrong in the last federal government with the female defence minister," Merz said, a reference to former defence minister Christine Lambrecht.

Lambrecht resigned in early 2023 after facing broad criticism over her handling of the ministry and bungled public comments.

Merz cited her as an example of what he described as the pitfalls of the gender parity policy of Chancellor Olaf Scholz's coalition.

Merz said that Lambrecht was "such a blatant miscast" as defence minister and that he did not want to repeat such mistakes.

"We are not doing the women any favours either," Merz said.

At the same time, however, Merz said that he was trying to put women in leadership posts within the CDU party apparatus, and said he would make at least some such efforts in a future government.