Germany: one election, two possible coalitions
Some 58% of citizens believe the CDU-CSU does not have the "legitimacy" to form the next government, according to an INsa poll for Bild.
AP - Markus Schreiber
Text by: Pascal Thibaut Follow
6 mins
The legislative elections of September 26 marked the departure of Angela Merkel after sixteen years in power in Berlin.
The Social Democrats won ahead of the Conservatives, but the candidates for chancellery of these two parties, Olaf Scholz and Armin Laschet, hope to form a government with the Greens and the Liberals.
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From our correspondent in Berlin
,
The SPD that many had buried confirmed its resurrection by improving its score in the polls by ten points in just a few weeks.
With 25.7%, the Social Democrats increased their result -
historically low in 2017
- and finished first.
This is the second time since the founding of the Federal Republic in 1949 that the SPD has supplanted the Christian Democrats.
Olaf Scholz, the man for the job
The performance achieved in the home stretch is above all due to the person of the candidate for the chancellery Olaf Scholz more than to the attractiveness of his party.
The current finance minister is seen as competent and enjoys much higher popularity than his opponents.
It embodies stability and continuity while at the same time symbolizing change.
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Elections in Germany: the social democrats back in the game
The Christian Democrats record the worst score in their history with 24.1%, a decline of nine points compared to the already bad result of 2017. The Merkel era is therefore coming to an end for the party that the Chancellor led for 18 years by a disaster. Conservative candidate Armin Laschet acknowledged a disappointing result that he sought to put into perspective by highlighting his party's comeback in the home stretch and the fact that he would have prevented a coalition of Social Democrats and Greens with the party of the radical left Die Linke.
Nevertheless: the defeat of Armin Laschet is historic. Its lack of popularity and credibility largely explains this result. His declared ambition to form a coalition to stay in power with the Liberals and the Greens is provoking negative reactions. The press is not tender this Tuesday morning with the candidate for the chancellery of the Christian Democrats. The popular daily "Bild" predicts in one "The day of settling scores". The comments criticize Armin Laschet's ambition to form a government. "
It's over,
" writes the
Berlin
Tagesspiegel
without appeal
; the conservative daily "Die Welt" talks about "
The uncle and his fairy tales
".
Party officials are calling for more "humility" and pleading for a renewal and rejuvenation of the CDU.
Two Christian Democrat youth federations go further and demand the resignation of Armin Laschet.
Two-thirds of Germans want the CDU president to step down.
FDP Greens and Liberals highly courted
The two forces which arrive in third and fourth position will be the kingmakers of a future coalition. The Greens first of all who achieve their best score in a national election, 14.8%, since the creation of the party more than 40 years ago. But environmentalists were at the top six months ago in the polls when their chancellor candidate was nominated.
Annalena Baerbock
could, according to press reports, give way as vice-chancellor in a future government to the co-president of the Greens Robert Habeck, who had let her colleague lead the campaign.
The ecologists have already been in power at the national level alongside the Social Democrats when Gerhard Schröder was Chancellor between 1998 and 2005. They are pawing their way back to business in Berlin and in particular working on the necessary energy transition, a subject at the heart of their program. German environmentalists are admittedly in opposition to the Bundestag since 2005 but currently participate in eleven of the sixteen regional governments. They therefore have many managers with executive powers.
The FDP liberals also want to get back to business in Berlin and prove their ability to run the country.
Their last participation in a government between 2009 and 2013 with Angela Merkel's Christian Democrats ended in an electoral fiasco.
The sanctioned FDP failed to cross the 5% mark required to be represented in the Bundestag.
After crossing the desert, the party made a comeback four years ago.
But by slamming the door to negotiations after the 2017 elections to form a coalition between the Christian Democrats and the Greens, the liberals were scratching their image as a responsible party.
Hence the importance this fall of getting back to business.
With 11.5% of the vote, the Liberals gained slightly on Sunday.
A "traffic light" coalition
Social Democrat Olaf Scholz, who hopes to form a government with the Greens and the Liberals, stressed that the three parties likely to form a so-called “
traffic light
” coalition
"Grew on Sunday - more than 12% in total - and embody a change for the country.
Six in ten Germans, in a poll carried out on Monday, want Olaf Scholz to become chancellor.
This will require overcoming the differences between the three parties.
They are particularly important between liberals and greens (environment, fiscal policy, financing of pensions, economic and social policy).
This is why these two smaller forces could initially discuss together in order to find a compromise before choosing whether to ally themselves with the Christians and the Social Democrats.
An unprecedented approach in Germany.
Two other parties,
the Alternative for Germany, AfD
, on the far right and the radical left Die Linke, are again represented in the Bundestag. But the voters sanctioned these two forces which lose three million votes. The AfD remains strong in its bastions of the former GDR in the East and arrives for example in first position in Saxony and Thuringia. But the party has failed to broaden its base in the West. Its flagship topic, immigration, did not play an important role in the campaign. Die Linke suffered an even more severe setback.
As in 2017, Germany will therefore be patient again before having a new government.
If discussions were to be carried out by both the SPD and the Christian Democrats, it could take a long time.
Olaf Scholz said Monday September 27 that it was necessary to ensure that Germany has a new government before Christmas, but that is only a hope.
For the French presidency of the European Union in the first half of 2022, it would be preferable to have an “operational” German partner.
This also applies to Berlin for the leadership of the G7 next year.
In the meantime,
Angela Merkel
continues to manage day-to-day business.
► Also to listen: Angela Merkel, the end of an era
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