Politicians Flock to Flood Zone

Continuing heavy downpours had turned the Alpine regions of the southern German state of Bavaria and neighboring Switzerland and Austria on Wednesday into a bleak watery landscape.

Several low-lying areas had been completely submerged, residents had to be rescued by boats and helicopters in many places and tourist hotels were evacuated. Roads and rail lines remained blocked as aid workers and emergency services struggled to shore up dykes and dams with sandbags despite several rivers bursting their banks. Drinking water and electricity were in short supply in some areas following the complete breakdown in public services.

Several regions in Bavaria such as Kempten, Augsburg and Garmisch-Partenkirchen were on red alert after authorities said that water levels had exceeded the catastrophic floods of 1999, deemed the worst of the century at the time, which hit Bavaria.

However, in comparison to Switzerland and Austria, where six people had been killed by Tuesday, Germany was only counting injured victims of the catastrophe. On Wednesday, authorities were warning that the Danube river could submerge its banks as residents of the towns of Passau and Regensburg were bracing for the flood waters.

Politicians scramble to offer help

The unfolding tragedy has also sent the country's politicians scrambling to the flood-affected areas. They are in the midst of an election campaign for federal polls likely to be held on Sept. 18 and sense an opportunity to score points.

On Tuesday, Edmund Stoiber, Bavarian premier and leader of the Christian Social Union (CSU), the sister party of the opposition conservative Christian Democratic Union (CDU), broke off his election campaign to clamber into an armored military helicopter and pay a hasty visit to the village of Eschenloher which has been cut off from the outside world.

"The citizens should know that we won't leave them alone," Stoiber (photo) said after a quick round of the devastated place. In a sign that garnering sympathy from voters is uppermost in most politician's minds at this time, Stoiber added that his Bavarian government had invested millions in flood-prevention and had been "the only state in Germany" to do so.

Stoiber's government has invested around 670 million euros in flood-prevention systems since the 2002 floods and the CSU chief was quick to highlight the benefits. "There is more water than in the big flood of Whitsun 1999," Stoiber said, "but there is less damage because of our flood control."

German Chancellor Gerhard Schröder, who plans to use a campaign visit in Augsburg on Thursday to tour the affected regions and get first-hand information, hit back at Stoiber in the pages of the Münchner Merkur on Wednesday, crticizing the same flood control methods his former rival was so proud of.

"For the last two years, the funds for flood control in Bavaria have been cut," Schröder told the paper. "Everyone knows very well the public wants money saved but at the same time one must consider in what areas we must make these savings."

Schröder dismissed allegations that he would use the floods to gain political capital, saying: "In such a situation, it is not about party differences, it is only about helping people. " He added that he would be mobilizing emergency services to help the afflicted areas.

In a statement timed to support his pledge, Defense Minister Peter Struck said some 1,000 soldiers had been deployed to boost flood defenses with another 1,000 on standby.

Other politicians were also quick to react to the catastrophe. The CDU and the free-market liberal Free Democratic Party (FDP), a likely coalition partner of the conservatives in a future government, called off their planned summit on Wednesday saying that the affected regions had priority.

Meanwhile Interior Minister Otto Schily was on the ground visiting the worst hit areas of Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Mühldorf am Inn and Eschenlohe while Foreign Minsiter Joschka Fischer was said to be talking to EU officials in Brussels with a view to securing aid.

Will the floods save Schröder again?

The event has inevitably stirred memories of the 2002 election campaign when catastrophic floods in eastern Germany were largely credited for Schröder's re-election.

At the time, Schröder -- who was badly trailing in the polls -- rushed to eastern Germany to offer affected residents sympathy and aid worth millions. Television images of the chancellor wading through the flood waters in rubber boots and a green raincoat to visit affected homes and residents is believed to have helped to sway voters, thus ensuring that Schröder came up from behind to defeat his conservative challenger Edmund Stoiber.

This time seems no different and Germany's media is already commenting wryly on the political mileage to be extracted from the catastrophe and whether it might save Schröder yet again.

"Bavaria Under Water. Schröder's Coming," read the headline in the Berliner Zeitung on Wednesday. "The Elbe river floods dominated talks for weeks and decided the election (in 2002). Gerhard Schröder saved himself in rubber boots into his next term," the paper said in an editorial. "One can certainly do politics with water."

The mass-selling Bild was more graphic. It splashed a picture of Schröder looking heavenwards on its front page and an election poster of his current conservative challenger Angela Merkel submerged in the flood waters with the headline "The floods are here again! Will it save him (Schröder)?"