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The centre-right party’s leader Friedrich Merz said CDU and SPD are to enter talks to form a coalition, one day after the German election on Sunday.
Talks between the Christian Democratic Party (CDU) and Social Democrats (SPD) are to begin within the next couple of days, CDU leader Friedrich Merz announced during a press conference in Berlin on Monday.Merz said that initial talks about establishing a black-red coalition have already taken place and aims for the new government to be formed by Easter, which this year falls on 20 April.He highlighted his goal of steering Germany out of its economic crisis, particularly in light of the uncertain relationship with the US and the ongoing stagnation of Europe’s largest economy.Germany narrowly avoided a recession last year, but the economy is flagging, as many major companies, such as Volkswagen, Bosch and Ford, have announced thousands of job cuts. Merz is promising a strong government that will focus on restoring the economy with less interparty fighting, which plagued the “traffic light” coalition government over the past three years.All three “traffic light” coalition leaders — Chancellor Olaf Scholz, Vice Chancellor Robert Habeck and former Finance Minister Christian Lindner — have signalled that they will not be playing any major political roles in the future. For the centre-left SPD, the 16.5% result on Sunday was bitter, as it was the worst performance in its history.Both the liberal Free Democrats (FDP) and left-wing conservative BSW failed to win over 5% of the votes, meaning they will not have seats in the Bundestag for the next four years. The far-left Die Linke or The Left party surpassed expectations on Sunday evening, winning almost 9% of the vote.The voter turnout at yesterday’s election was the highest in decades, despite a large number of Germans being relatively undecided about who they would vote for until the very last minute.Merz’s speech on Monday also underlined that Merz will prioritise migration during talks with the SPD. He also warned about far-right AfD’s success on Sunday, where they received a record 20% of the vote.However, the centre-right CDU faces an uphill battle to stimulate the economy and increase defence spending as questions about reforming the debt brake emerge.
