Background
Koch was born in Frankfurt am Main.
consultant jurist lawyer politician president
Koch was born in Frankfurt am Main.
In 1985 he completed his studies to become a lawyer
He was the 7th Minister President of Hesse from 7 April 1999, immediately becoming the 53rd President of the Bundesrat, completing the term begun by his predecessor as Minister President, Hans Eichel, until his resignation on 31 August 2010. On 29 October 2010, he was announced as designated chief executive officer of Bilfinger Berger, Germany’s second-largest builder. In 1979, Koch became the youngest person to hold the office of chairmain of the Christian Democratic Union in Main-Taunus district.
From 1983 until 1987 he was vice-chair of the federal youth organization of the Christian Democratic Union. Until 1993 Koch was a city council member in his hometown of Eschborn.
In 1987 he got elected to the legislature of Hessen, where he became vice-chair of the Christian Democratic Union parliamentary group in 1991 and in 1993 its chairman Since 1998 he has also been chair of the Hessian state party.
Koch is seen as a rhetorically gifted politician. Critics have accused him of populism.
In the state elections in 1999, the Christian Democratic Union began collecting signatures to document the resistance in the population to plans of the federal government to make dual citizenship easier for foreigners to obtain.
Because some people viewed this action as "collecting signatures against foreigners", they tried to portray this campaign as "xenophobic". In November 2006 Koch was elected vice-chairman of the Christian Democratic Union. Prior to the Hesse state election of 2008 Koch was once again accused of using xenophobic tactics by pledging to get tough on youth crime, which is concentrated among immigrant and minority groups. In the course of the election he lost his party"s majority in the Hessian Parliament, but remained acting Minister President as his Social Democratic Party of Germany challenger Andrea Ypsilanti was unable to form a government.
Since none of the parties was able to build a majority coalition, they decided to give the voters another chance to produce a workable result.
In the January 2009 election the Freie Demokratische Partei (Free Democratic Party) made significant gains which allowed Koch to form a conservative-liberal coalition government, reelecting him as the Minister President of the State of Hesse. On 25 May 2010 Koch announced his withdrawal from the political scene.
He resigned as Minister-President of Hesse on 31 August 2010. He hinted that he was departing politics in order to become active in the business world.
His father Karl-Heinz Koch was also a politician in Hessen.
He is a Roman Catholic.
He was also a member of the Main-Taunus district council and parliamentary leader of the local Christian Democratic Union group from 1989 until 1997.