Joerg Asmussen is to leave the European Central Bank’s Executive Board for a government position, depriving President Mario Draghi of a key German ally.

Asmussen, 47, will become deputy labor minister in German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s government and will shortly resign from his post at the ECB, he said in a statement distributed by the Frankfurt-based institution Sunday. Asmussen has been on the six-person Executive Board, which implements monetary policy for the euro area, since January 2012. His term was scheduled to run until 2019.

Asmussen has been a crucial link to Germany for the ECB, criss-crossing the nation to explain what the central bank can and can’t do to ease the euro area’s debt crisis. Bundesbank President Jens Weidmann, the second German representative on the decision-making Governing Council, has been an outspoken critic of some policies including the bond-buying plan dubbed Outright Monetary Transactions.

“Asmussen’s network into the German government will surely be missed,” said Carsten Brzeski, senior economist at ING Groep NV in Brussels. “He wasn’t afraid to represent the ECB’s view toward the German media. He acted as a counterweight and convincingly defended the ECB’s line of argument.” (Bloomberg)