VIENNA (Reuters) - Germany should push Bundesbank chief Jens Weidmann as a successor to European Central Bank President Mario Draghi and it is a grave political mistake not to have done this more, ECB policymaker Ewald Nowotny said in remarks published on Thursday.
Draghi's job will become available at the end of next year. By that time Nowotny - the head of the Austrian National Bank and a moderate policy hawk who has often sided with Weidmann - will have left his post too.
"I would have welcomed a candidacy of Weidmann very much," Nowotny told the Oberoesterreichische Nachrichten newspaper. "I personally believe it is a grave political mistake by (German Chancellor) Angela Merkel that she is no longer pursuing Weidmann's candidacy further."
(Reporting by Francois Murphy; Editing by Balazs Koranyi)
