Some years ago a handful of female political correspondents in Berlin each received a bizarre package in the post. It contained sunglasses, a pair of flip-flops, and a bikini branded in the white and sky-blue colours of the Bavarian Christian Social Union (CSU) party.
There was also a card with the message: “Wishing you a perfect performance in the beach weather.”
Today the man who sent those parcels is on the brink of the most serious choice of his life. After three decades as the joker in the pack of German politics Markus Söder, 54, leader of the CSU and chief minister of Bavaria, must decide whether to run for the chancellorship.
