GERMANY SET TO FACE A TOUGH 2025 WHOEVER WINS

All eyes will be on the support given to the far right party, Alternative fur Deutschland (AfD), which has consistently been polling second in Germany for more than a year and a half.

- JOHN DOBSON

With Europe still recovering from the excoriating speech by US Vice President Vance in Munich last week, the European Union’s most populous and important country, Germany, goes to the polls today to elect a new parliament. The stage is now set for a contest between established parties and a surge of smaller contenders. Critically, the election comes at a time of heightened political uncertainty, with deep divisions over the country’s economic future, immigration policies and its role on the global stage. The future of the European Union might even be at stake.

Originally scheduled for September, today’s snap election is the result of the collapse of the governing coalition during last November’s political crisis. Olaf Scholtz, the incumbent chancellor of Germany, sacked his finance minister, Christian Lindler, over disagreements on how to revive Germany’s shrinking economy. Scholtz then lost a confidence vote in parliament by a large margin. Lindler is the leader of the Free Democratic Party (FDP), one of the three parties of the governing “traffic light” coalition, named after their traditional colours, respectively red, yellow and green. It’s very unlikely that any of the seven parties running in the election will have a majority in the Bundestag, the German parliament, so another coalition is expected. The big question is which of the parties will make up a government to lead Germany at a critical moment in its post-war history.