Germany's new power-sharing government began to take shape yesterday, with the Social Democrats (SPD) choosing a close ally of Gerhard Schroeder for the foreign ministry and an economic pragmatist for finance.

Frank-Walter Steinmeier, 49, Chancellor Schroeder's chief of staff since 1999 and a relative unknown on the national political scene, was nominated by the SPD to fill the key Foreign Ministry post, party officials said.

He will be joined in a new cabinet by Peer Steinbrueck, a centrist who is slated to become finance minister, and SPD chairman Franz Muentefering, a worker-friendly traditionalist who will wield ample power in the dual role of labor minister and vice-chancellor.

The SPD is to name half of the 16 cabinet members under a deal struck on Monday, which makes conservative leader Angela Merkel chancellor and sets the stage for the first German "grand coalition" of the center-right and center-left since the 1960s.

Neither the conservatives nor the SPD won enough support in a September 18 election to form a government with their preferred partners, forcing them into coalition talks.

If those talks, which begin on Monday and are expected to last nearly a month, are successful then Merkel will replace Schroeder and be charged with holding together the bi-partisan government.

The only conservative minister that has been named so far is Edmund Stoiber, long-time head of the Bavarian Christian Social Union, who is set to take the economy and technology portfolio. Merkel is expected to unveil the remaining names on Monday, members of her Christian Democrats said.

Given the power-sharing nature of the new government, it is unclear how much influence individual ministers will have. Cabinet decisions will require broad consensus and policy debates will be fraught, given the ideological differences between the rival parties.

Steinmeier would replace Joschka Fischer, who saw his own influence over policy as Schroeder took increasing interest in foreign affairs.

"(Steinmeier is) not someone who you know where he stands on foreign policy, what issues he will choose to focus on," said Martin Koopmann of the German Council on Foreign Relations.

"But he is certainly a very reliable manager," Koopmann added. Steinmeier's role as a policy coordinator and mediator could stand him in good stead to formulate foreign policy to satisfy both coalition partners.

(China Daily October 14, 2005)