Seventy-two-year-old activist pastor Joachim Gauck became German president by an overwhelming majority on March 18, marking the first time a candidate from the former communist east will serve as head of state. It was the third presidential election in three years for Germany after the abrupt resignations of Gauck's two predecessors.
Gauck secured 991 votes out of 1,232 from a special assembly of MPs and other dignitaries. Seventy-three-year-old renowned Nazi hunter Beate Klarsfeld nominated as a protest candidate by a far-Left Party, attracted 126 votes while a candidate for the extreme right drew three.
Leader of Peaceful Revolution
Gauck is a former pastor who opposed East Germany’s then—communist regime and became head of a federal agency overseeing the files of the Communists’ ubiquitous domestic intelligence service after Germany’s reunification. Gauck helped drive the peaceful revolution that brought down communist East Germany and later fought to ensure that the public would be granted access to the vast stash of files left behind by the despised Stasi secret police after reunification in 1990. He oversaw the archive for the next decade.
Hard-Won Freedom
Chancellor Angela Merkel, who also grew up under communism, hailed Gauck's victory as a sign of how Germany had transformed in the approximately 23 years since the Berlin Wall fell.
Merkel gave her backing to the plain-spoken Lutheran pastor in February after then President Christian Wulff stepped down amid a flurry of corruption allegations dating from his time as a state premier. Wulff served only 20 months of his five-year term in office.
He had replaced Horst Koehler, a former head of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) who bowed out after an uproar over comments he made appearing to justify using the military to serve Germany's economic interests.
Expectations are outsized for the new president, who has won a reputation across the country as an inspiring public speaker.
As a staunch Protestant like Merkel, he is keen to remind Germans that their hard-won freedoms carry weighty responsibilities with them -- a lifelong theme he has said he will take to the presidential palace.
Gauck himself warned scandal-weary Germans against seeing him as a redeemer, telling reporters the night he was nominated that they should not expect "Superman." He stressed again Sunday that he would "surely not be able to fill all expectations."
People’s Expectations
Expectations are outsized for Gauck, who has won a reputation across the country as an inspiring public speaker, albeit with a notorious touch of vanity. But as a staunch Protestant like Merkel, he is also keen to remind Germans that their hard-won freedoms carry weighty responsibilities with them -- a lifelong theme he has said he will take to the presidential palace.
Gauck secured 991 votes out of 1,232 from a special assembly of MPs and other dignitaries. Seventy-three-year-old renowned Nazi hunter Beate Klarsfeld nominated as a protest candidate by a far-Left Party, attracted 126 votes while a candidate for the extreme right drew three.
Leader of Peaceful Revolution
Gauck is a former pastor who opposed East Germany’s then—communist regime and became head of a federal agency overseeing the files of the Communists’ ubiquitous domestic intelligence service after Germany’s reunification. Gauck helped drive the peaceful revolution that brought down communist East Germany and later fought to ensure that the public would be granted access to the vast stash of files left behind by the despised Stasi secret police after reunification in 1990. He oversaw the archive for the next decade.
Hard-Won Freedom
Chancellor Angela Merkel, who also grew up under communism, hailed Gauck's victory as a sign of how Germany had transformed in the approximately 23 years since the Berlin Wall fell.
Merkel gave her backing to the plain-spoken Lutheran pastor in February after then President Christian Wulff stepped down amid a flurry of corruption allegations dating from his time as a state premier. Wulff served only 20 months of his five-year term in office.
He had replaced Horst Koehler, a former head of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) who bowed out after an uproar over comments he made appearing to justify using the military to serve Germany's economic interests.
Expectations are outsized for the new president, who has won a reputation across the country as an inspiring public speaker.
As a staunch Protestant like Merkel, he is keen to remind Germans that their hard-won freedoms carry weighty responsibilities with them -- a lifelong theme he has said he will take to the presidential palace.
Gauck himself warned scandal-weary Germans against seeing him as a redeemer, telling reporters the night he was nominated that they should not expect "Superman." He stressed again Sunday that he would "surely not be able to fill all expectations."
People’s Expectations
Expectations are outsized for Gauck, who has won a reputation across the country as an inspiring public speaker, albeit with a notorious touch of vanity. But as a staunch Protestant like Merkel, he is also keen to remind Germans that their hard-won freedoms carry weighty responsibilities with them -- a lifelong theme he has said he will take to the presidential palace.
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