Franz Müntefering

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Franz Müntefering, 2004

Franz Müntefering, 2005

Franz Müntefering (help·info) (born January 16, 1940) is a German politician and former chairman of the Social Democratic Party (SPD). Since November 22, 2005 he has served as Minister of Labour and Social Affairs and Vice-Chancellor in the cabinet of Angela Merkel.

He was born in Neheim (now part of Arnsberg) and joined the SPD in 1966. He was a member of the Bundestag from 1975 to 1992 and again since 1998; from 1995 to 1998 he was a member of the Landtag (state parliament) of North Rhine-Westphalia.

He was Bundesgeschäftsführer (executive director) of the SPD from 1995 to 1998, and after holding briefly the post of Minister of Transportation and Construction in the first cabinet Schröder he was the first to hold the new post of general secretary from 1999 to 2002, and thereafter became leader of the SPD fraction in the Bundestag. In February 2004 he was designated to succeed Chancellor Gerhard Schröder as party chairman in March 2004.

In April 2005, Müntefering criticized the market economy of Germany and proposed more state involvement to promote economic justice. In this speech, he described private equity firms as "locusts". He subsequently published a "locust list" of companies, which he circulated within the SPD [1]. This began a debate which has dominated the national news, being the subject of front-page articles and covered on the main television news broadcasts nearly every day. Müntefering's suggestions have been criticized by employers and many economists, but have met with popular support (up to 75% in some opinion polls).

On October 31, 2005, Müntefering's favoured candidate for Secretary General of the SPD, Kajo Wasserhövel, was defeated by the left-wing candidate Andrea Nahles in a preliminary internal election. Müntefering subsequently announced his intention to resign as SPD chairman, and was succeeded by Matthias Platzeck at the next party convention on November 15, 2005; Platzeck resigned from this position in April 2006 and his successor is Kurt Beck.