From today – and officially – Germany enters a phase of introversion, after the dissolution of the governing coalition, at the same time as the electoral victory of Donald Trump in the US presidential elections.
According to the timetable announced by Chancellor Olaf Solz, on January 15th a vote will be held on whether or not the government receives a vote of confidence from the Bundestag (the lower house).
It is most likely that the MPs will open the way for elections by the end of March.
Until then, the Social Democratic Party (SPD) and the Greens will continue to co-govern as a minority government, with the Christian Democratic Party (CDU) likely to tolerate, in order to pass crucial pension and industry support bills by the end of the year .
To this end, the chancellor will meet today with Christian Union (CDU/CSU) parliamentary group leader Friedrich Merz, who has so far avoided commenting publicly on the developments.
“Incomprehensible selfishness”
Addressing citizens, Chancellor Scholz blamed the collapse of the governing coalition on Free Democratic Party (FDP) leader Christian Lindner, accusing him of “incomprehensible egos” and “small-minded petty party tactics”.
“He broke my trust several times, arbitrarily canceled the budget agreement (…) There is no basis of trust for further cooperation, therefore serious government work is not possible,” the chancellor characteristically said in his highly charged speech.
Earlier, as part of the government committee meeting, the FDP leader suggested calling early elections, which the chancellor rejected. To Mr. Lindner’s complaints about the impossibility of agreement between the government partners, Olaf Solz responded with his dismissal from the Ministry of Finance, which obviously implies the departure of the FDP from the government.
A few hours later, the FDP announced the departure from the government of the remaining ministers of the party: Volker Vissing from the Ministry of Transport, Marco Bussmann from the Ministry of Justice and Bettina Stark-Wächinger from the Ministry of Education.
Mr. Lindner, for his part, stated among other things that he submitted proposals for economic recovery, which, as he emphasized, were not even accepted as a basis for consultation by the Social Democratic Party (SPD) and the Greens. “From the chancellor’s carefully prepared statement tonight we understood why,” the FDP leader said, accusing Olaf Solz of premeditated behaviour.
To Mr Scholtz’s accusation that Mr Lindner was calling for pension cuts and tax breaks for the rich, the now-ousted finance minister countered that even tonight the chancellor had urged him to lift the “debt brake” on “emergency” grounds, something with which, as he said, he could not agree. Olaf Solz sought, he said, to continue supporting Ukraine, the activation of the “emergency” rule, which justifies the additional emergency borrowing of the state. Christian Lindner even claimed that he proposed the jointly coordinated early appeal, which the chancellor rejected.
“Unfortunately, Olaf Solz has shown that he does not have the power to give our country a new beginning,” Mr. Lindner emphasized and added that this should be done by a new government.
Tonight’s outcome had been discounted by politicians, analysts and the media already in the previous days, as the tension between the until yesterday government partners escalated.
The countdown began last week, when Christian Lindner tabled a position paper calling for the immediate suspension of climate policy and an almost radical overhaul of the government’s overall economic strategy, implying that by accepting the proposals the FDP’s stay in government would be judged.
How did the country’s media react?
The Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung spoke of a “difficult parting” in its commentary, pointing out that “at the end of an eventful day, Olaf Solz dismisses his finance minister, as his relationship with the president of the FDP is clearly so broken that the common course has ended after almost three years”.
“The end of the governing coalition is good news for Germany,” Süddeutsche Zeitung opined, noting that “the rulers treated each other with contempt.” New elections will be held in the spring and then a reorganization could take place, the newspaper assured.
Der Spiegel noted the new, “combative” tone adopted by the chancellor, both in his announcements and internally, when he later met with his party’s caucus. “Many MPs described him as combative and comfortable. The chancellor urged MPs to conduct themselves with professionalism and discipline,” the magazine explained.
“This decline is a logical consequence” of the US elections, assessed, in a different style, Focus, explaining that “the message from this double blow says that the strength of Donald Trump’s electoral victory seduced the German coalition and the failure of the governing coalition is Trump’s first major success.” The people in Germany “had long been fed up with the alliance of these inequalities, of the lovers of argument and the obsessed with morality. “Never before has a federal chancellor managed to destroy the trust placed in him in such a lasting way in such a short period of time,” Focus opined, describing Olaf Solz with terms such as “detached” and “alienated from reality” as he “stubbornly refuses and arrogantly his personal responsibility for his own political failure”.
“Olaf Solz didn’t fail because of Christian Lindner, but mainly because of Olaf Solz,” the magazine judged.
“Soltz ends the government coalition with a bang and the mud fight follows,” commented the ntv television network, emphasizing that the accusations launched by the chancellor against Mr. Lindner “are unprecedented, especially for the otherwise rather moderate social democrat and it is possible to mark the beginning of a mudslinging that Germany has never experienced at the end of a government alliance”.
“Finally the end!” summarizes Bild, recalling that for months Olaf Solz’s coalition “kept the country in suspense – but only in the sense of quarrels and discontent” and noting that the government did not in any way live up to its real duty , to lead Germany out of the crisis. “On the contrary: the coalition parties led the country even deeper into chaos through grumbling and constant recriminations.” In the end, Christian Lindner, the tabloid continues, “gathered the necessary courage to end the red-yellow-green drama. It opened the way for a new beginning and did what the majority of citizens have long demanded of traffic lights: pull the plug.” On the one hand it is understandable that Mr. Soltz is now attacking Mr. Lindner so strongly. After all, the coalition is history. And Chancellor Soltz too, the newspaper claimed.
Handelsblatt assessed in its commentary that “Lidner’s consistent course towards new elections deserves respect” and that Olaf Scholz and Robert Habeck were unwilling to take responsibility for a reorganization or new elections, so Lindner took action by doing the right thing right time. “We would almost like to say: Respect, Mr. Lindner, risking one’s position to remain true to oneself does not happen often in politics,” added the financial newspaper.
“Delayed Release”
The leaders of the Alternative for Germany (AfD) parliamentary group, Alice Weidel and Tino Khrupala, characterized the dissolution of the government coalition as a belated “liberation” of Germany.
“The alliance of the SPD, the Greens and the FDP led the country into the economic abyss. After months of inactivity and countless sessions of psychotherapy and navel-gazing, we now need a fundamental political reboot in order to lead the economy and the entire country out of this serious crisis it has fallen into due to the ideologically driven politics of the SPD, the Greens and the FDP,” they argued in their statement and added that Chancellor Olaf Solz “must offer the country his last service and immediately ask for a vote of confidence.”
Source: RES-MPE
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