Friedrich Merz, leader of the German conservatives, was humiliated in Parliament today as he failed to win a majority in a secret ballot to become Chancellor. The Telegraph has the story.
On Tuesday morning, German MPs held a secret ballot to elect the country’s next leader. It was largely viewed as a formality because Mr Merz had already agreed to lead a coalition government.
But Mr Merz fell short of the majority required to become Chancellor by just six votes, an unprecedented sign of dissent from his centre-Right CDU (Christian Democratic Union) party and its coalition allies.
Mr Merz won 310 votes in the secret ballot, six short of the majority he required to lead the next German government.
Shocked CDU politicians left the chamber for urgent talks after the result, amid speculation in the German media that some of their MPs had rebelled due to policy disagreements with Mr Merz.
The CDU leader can still hold a second vote in the Bundestag, the German Parliament, to try and secure his majority.
If that were to fail, a third round of voting would occur, in which he would only need to secure the highest number of votes in Parliament, rather than a majority.
The result is a major embarrassment for Mr Merz. In a further setback, CDU sources told German media that there would be no second round of voting on Tuesday.
That meant Mr Merz would not be appointed as German Chancellor on Tuesday, throwing his schedule for the rest of the week – which included several visits to European capitals – into disarray.
Mr Merz was due to embark on a blitz of foreign policy visits to Paris, Warsaw and Brussels in some of his first tasks as Chancellor. It was unclear if those trips would go ahead.
It is not known when the second round of voting will take place, but the CDU’s leadership will first need to try and find out why its coalition allies withheld support.
It remains unclear why Mr Merz lost the ballot as it was held in secret. Officials in his CDU party are now frantically trying to establish who withheld their support and why.
Mr Merz’s coalition agreement consisted of his CDU party, its sister party Christian Social Union (CSU) and the centre-Left Social Democrats (SPD).
Suspicion would naturally first fall on the SPD, Mr Merz’s coalition ally, as more likely to betray Mr Merz than his own MPs. But Lars Klingbeil, the SDP leader, strongly denied that his side was responsible for the shortage in votes.
Jurgen Hardt, a CDU MP, said that his party was holding talks to try and understand what has gone wrong, adding: “Those in the coalition who didn’t vote for Friedrich Merz must ask themselves whose business they’re running.”
Worth reading in full.
My theory: Merz alienated his own supporters, including his own MPs, with his sell-out to the Left and treachery in respect of voters’ wishes so much that too many of his MPs decided independently to lodge a protest vote under the cover of secrecy.
Stop Press: Merz has now been successfully elected Chancellor after a second round of voting was held in the Bundestag on Tuesday after all. The upset turns out to have been short but sweet, and has left Merz damaged as he begins his term.
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