Obviously, there is no real debate about the question who should replace Verheugen since German elections will take place at the end of September. A couple of months ago, there were rumors (some more here) that Wolfgang Schäuble could be one of the potential candidates. I argued here why this is a pretty bad idea. The German government already indicated that it would like to have either the internal market, the competition or the industry portfolio.

Anyway a few days ago, Spiegel Online reported that Peer Steinbrück (check his wikipedia profile here – and his website here), currently finance minster, is a potential candidate. Merkel apparently wants to reward him for “his handling of the financial crisis”. According to this article the scenario is more likely if the SPD (that is part of a grand coalition with the CDU at the moment) looses the general elections and Merkel can form a CDU-FDP government – and Steinbrück, a SPD politician, would loose his job. So why would Merkel nominate somebody from the opposition? Apparently Barroso is active in the background:

Merkel has said in the past that the post should be filled by a member of her Christian Democrats. But Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso has been urging European governments nominating their national candidates for the Commission to make sure that it isn’t staffed by too many conservatives.

It is pretty sure that nothing will be decided before the elections on 27 Sep. So we have to wait and see.