Berlin - German Chancellor Angela Merkel dismissed criticism of her style of leadership on Wednesday and called for unity among her conservative Christian Democrat (CDU) and Christian Social Union (CSU) alliance.

At times of crisis, the people wanted her and the CDU-CSU to get on with the job, Merkel said in an interview with the mass- circulation Bild newspaper six months before general elections.

Merkel dismissed criticism by party bigwig Guenter Oettinger, premier of the southern state of Baden-Wuerttemberg, who called on her to put aside "her chancellor's uniform and don the uniform of party chairman" in order to demonstrate what the CDU stands for.

"I don't wear a uniform, so that doesn't apply to me," she said. "When I'm party chairman I don't lay aside my state responsibility, and when I carry out my duties as chancellor I'm still the CDU chairman."

Three opinion polls released last week showed the CDU losing ground to its centre-left coalition partner, the Social Democrats (SPD), as the economic downturn takes its toll in Germany.

With national elections due September 27, the unlikely alliance has been hamstrung by what voters perceive as a lack of political will to push through major policy changes.

This has prompted calls from some leading members of the CDU for the party drop its course of seeking to accommodate the SPD and to sharpen its conservative profile.

Merkel said she could understand the dissatisfaction, which she believed was triggered by uncertainty caused by budgetary adjustments and a need to reform the job market in view of the economic crisis.

Merkel's fortunes and those of her party have waned since the recession took hold in Germany at the end of 2008, and she has been accused of indecision for her slow response to dealing with the crisis.

Conservatives with her party were also angered at her recent criticism of Pope Benedict XVI for his handling of the case of holocaust denier Bishop Richard Williamson.

Her failure to defend prominent CDU member Erika Steinbach from Polish criticism of her planned role on the board of a museum devoted to depicting the ordeal of Germans expelled from eastern Europe at the end of World War II also annoyed some party supporters.

Merkel said the economic crisis was the worst to hit Germany in more than six decades, and required state intervention in the banking sector and elsewhere if necessary.

She said her government had not yet decided on state aid for troubled carmaker Opel because it was still waiting for details of a new business model from the company's US parent General Motors. (dpa)