(Adnkronos) – The incumbent chancellor is not discouraged, he remains combative, the Cdu/Csu of the challenger Friedrich Merz maintains its advantage. There are now only two days left before the vote that will renew the German Federal Chamber, the Bundestag, and in the face of substantially stable polls, people are reasoning about possible coalition hypotheses, taking into account all the variables. And the time factor.
THE OUTCOME OF THE VOTE. The leader of the Spd and current head of the executive, Olaf Scholz, insists: “This time, as never before in another election, many people will only decide when they are in the voting booth,” he says confidently. “And I think many will say: it should be Olaf Scholz again”. The mind goes to the legendary comeback of 2021: then, as now, his party began the election campaign with a delay of about 15 percentage points, but managed to overtake the Cdu/Csu weeks before the elections and then managed to cut the finish line with a narrow advantage. This time, the gap remains and the Union’s candidate chancellor Merz already seems like the sure winner.
So much so that at the Munich Security Conference last weekend he was introduced as ‘chancellor’ by an organizer. In the television debates, he lets Scholz’s attacks slide off him with the air of a statesman, comment observers quoted by the German media. And he is meticulously preparing to form a government the day after the elections. “Here in the Adenauer Haus we have already prepared ourselves for different scenarios, which have also been put in writing”, he recently told Politico.
FOUR PARLIAMENTARY GROUPS. The formation of the government largely depends on the number of parties that will enter the Bundestag. Four parliamentary groups will certainly be part of the new Parliament: Cdu/Csu (27-31% in this week’s polls), AfD (20-21%), Spd (15-17%) and Verdi (12-14%). The Left (Die Linke, in clear recovery), the Fdp and the Bsw (Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance) are struggling to overcome the five percent threshold. If none or only one of these three parties were to enter the Bundestag, the chances of a two-way coalition would be good.
COALITIONS IN TWO. All other parties have ruled out a coalition with the AfD, including the Cdu/Csu. “This is clear and definitive”, reiterated Merz on Wednesday in the ‘Bild’ and ‘Welt’ television duel. For now, two options remain: in almost all current polls, the Cdu/Csu forms a majority with the Spd, and for half of the institutes the same goes for the Cdu/Csu-Verdi option. However, the Csu does not want to govern with the Greens under any circumstances, which is why coalition negotiations between the Cdu/Csu and the Spd are considered the most likely option at the moment.
The problem for the Spd is the risk of obtaining a result that does not live up to expectations (20.5% in 2017 was the worst result) and of entering the coalition negotiations weakened. With which leader? Olaf Scholz, Lars Klingbeil or the most popular politician in Germany, Bororis Pistorius?
One way or another, the Spd will try to raise the price of participation in the coalition, experts quoted by the German media argue. Ultimately, the outcome should be approved by a party congress or even a membership vote, one more lever to use in negotiations. If the price were to become too exorbitant, the Cdu/Csu could still resort to the black-green option. In any case, it is likely that Merz will also speak with the Greens – if a two-party coalition with them were arithmetically possible – regardless of Csu leader Markus Söder, who is absolutely against a black-green coalition. If only to avoid giving in to the demands of the Spd from the start.
COALITIONS IN THREE. The tripartite coalition experiment at federal level failed miserably with the traffic light government (Spd-Fdp-Verdi). For this reason, such a hypothesis is now seen only as an emergency solution in case nothing else works. Since the Fdp has ruled out a coalition with the Greens with a resolution of the party congress, only two options remain: a so-called German coalition (from the colors of the flag, black, yellow, red) between Cdu/Csu, Spd and Fdp, if the liberals were to enter the Bundestag. Or a black-red-green coalition (Cdu/Csu-Spd, Verdi also known by some as the Kenya coalition, from the name of the country’s colors). In both cases, the more people sitting at the table, the more complicated the situation becomes, observers comment.
However, it remains to be seen whether the Fdp will be able to enter the Bundestag. It would only be the second time since 1949 that the Liberals have not been admitted to Parliament. The Left Party, on the other hand, could hold some surprises. After the success at the regional level of the newly formed Bsw of the former parliamentary group leader Sahra Wagenknecht, it had no longer been in the spotlight. However, the discussion on the AfD’s ‘cordon sanitaire’ and a skillful social media campaign have allowed the party to return to prominence in the polls. On the other hand, the initial momentum of the Bsw is weakening again. However, it remains highly unlikely that BSW or the Left Party will participate in a government led by the SPD or the Greens. The polls do not confirm this and Chancellor Scholz underlines: “It is not a plan that any of us have, so there is no need to worry”.
THE PARTY WITH WHICH NO ONE WANTS TO GOVERN, will surely be one of Sunday’s winners. According to all polls, the AfD, which has been classified by the Office for the Protection of the Constitution as right-wing extremist in some parts of the country, is likely to double its 10.3% result in the 2021 elections. The party has already secured its successes in the election campaign: with its help, the Cdu/Csu obtained a majority in the Bundestag to carry out a resolution on migration policy. Party leader Alice Weidel appeared on television for the first time on an equal footing with chancellor candidates Scholz, Merz and Robert Habeck of the Greens. The AfD is betting on the next elections, where it hopes to become the most important force. For the centrist parties – commentators underline – it will be important to prevent this from happening in the next four years. The number one prerequisite is a coalition that this time does not fight a trench warfare within it.
TIME FACTOR: for almost four months Germany has had a red-green minority government with limited capacity for action. Scholz will remain chancellor until a new government is sworn in, whatever the outcome. However, once the new Bundestag is constituted, he will only be a managing director of Germany, without power. And this at a time when the world is undergoing rapid change. As Germany heads to the polls, US President Donald Trump is negotiating with Russian President Vladimir Putin over the future of Ukraine, while the EU appears increasingly isolated. The time factor is felt by politicians: it is no coincidence that Merz keeps repeating that he wants a government in office by Easter.
