By IMRE KARACS and LLOYD RUNDLE
BERLIN - Germany's consumer revolt over BSE turned to anger yesterday as political leaders and farm experts came under attack for claiming the disease would not enter the country.
Butchers reported falling beef sales amid calls for the resignation of Chancellor Gerhard Schröder's farm and health ministers following news that at least two of the country's cows have been infected.
Britain's Agriculture Minister, Nick Brown, added to the gloom by threatening to slap an illegal ban on French beef if advisers warn the public is at risk from a new BSE threat. The Tories have warned that France may attempt to send "risky" meat to Britain, but Mr Brown said yesterday that he would act now and argue later if a ban was needed.
But the full blast of consumer anger was felt in Germany. "We believed the nonsense the whitewashers told us – that Germany was free from BSE," fumed the Welt am Sonntag newspaper. "They made fools of us with the long-winded promises that Germany is safe from BSE," echoed the Berliner Morgenpost.
Bärbel Höhn, the Green Environment Minister of North Rhine-Westphalia, who has warned for years about such an eventuality, said politicians had ignored the threat for too long.
"We should have dealt with BSE earlier and more rigorously," she said. "Mistakes were made in the past, for which we must now pay the bitter price."
After the discovery of two German-born cows infected with BSE, officials of the 16 federal Länder ordered a ban on meat-based fodder, believed to be the main route of infection, but the fodder had been outlawed for cattle in Germany since 1994.
For procedural reasons, the German government cannot impose a full ban until Wednesday at the earliest. The German Farmers' Federation has asked for a two-week delay, arguing that there is not enough substitute fodder in the country and that the animals would starve.
However, the once-mighty farming lobby is unlikely to get a sympathetic hearing in the current climate as consumer panic grows and political complacency comes under attack.
Opposition politicians were quick to attack the government for risking the life of Germans.
"It is disgraceful the way the government put commerce ahead of public safety," said the Bavarian Prime Minister, Edmund Stoiber.
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