Divisive figure may replace Merkel as head of Germany’s CDU If the party picks millionaire lawyer Friedrich Merz as its leader, he might drive centrist voters loyal to Angela Merkel into the arms of the Greens or the SPD By Philip Oltermann / The Guardian, BERLIN When German Chancellor Angela Merkel steps down in September, she will leave behind a conservative party that has been a practically unchallenged political force in Germany for 16 years and leads political polls by a towering 15 percentage points. And yet the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) might thank her today by electing as its new leader one of her longest-standing political rivals, a man who represents a return to the pre-Merkel past not just in terms of ideological values, but also style of leadership.