Opel: increasingly critical situation

Last Friday in Berlin, the heads of GM Europe have met with economic ministers of the government of Angela Merkel. According to the ministers themselves to the press, the result was "disastrous." A government official told the Bild that the summit was "outrageous" and added: "On this basis the State will not give a single cent." It was repeated, in short, the script already recited from the Big Three in Detroit last fall in Washington before the U.S. Congress. Namely: political gentlemen, give a hand to not fail even if we have no idea how to spend your money. But if in the U.S., the social impact of a crisis of the Detroit district has convinced Parliament to grant, but in time, a loan to GM and Chrysler, in Germany it is hard to see what happens. Sufficient to regard the words of the chancellor, Angela Merkel: "We will help Opel if the benefit to the community will be greater than the damage. Unfortunately, for now this is not the case. " He echoed the Minister of Economy, Karl-Theodor zu Guttenberg, where the coffers of the State does not come out a euro until Opel and GM Europe will not have presented a decent strategic plan, which warrants a public aid. That executive is a courageous position: 2009 in Germany is election year, and the policy rationale would suggest a history of helping the car in Germany, with 55mila employees across Europe of which 25 thousand home. But the government has already passed a law that opens the nationalization of banks, when necessary, due to the weight of social institutions. The industry obviously does not have the same impact. That is why GM has to offer something new compared with the simple request for 3.3 billion euros and promised to sell between 25 and 50% of Opel to an outside investor (the best of them, according to the Allgemeine Frankfuter Zeitung, the major German economic daily, you may Fiat). In addition to policy choices, however, to cool the soul state Opel to believe it was the discovery last Friday that GM would sell the U.S. patents Opel as security for loans received. In other words, the ideas born in the German research center that is located close to Ruesselsheim (later developed for all GM brands) have been mortgaged. At a time when the creative and intellectual freshness is vital for the rebirth of the car in the world, news of this kind was bound to irritate the German political parties. Meanwhile, the crisis of Opel runs are at risk of closing the plants in Bochum and Eisenach Germany, and Antwerp in Belgium, employing about 11mila employees.