Her famous pragmatism this time failed. Angela Merkel, considered the most powerful woman in the world and the guarantor of stability after Donald Trump came to power, faces an uncertain future. Together with his party, the Christian Democratic Union (CDU), Merkel failed in negotiations to form a new government after his weak victory in the September elections. But the chancellor, who has been in power since 2005, is ready to be a candidate again in any anticipated elections. She prefers it to governing in the minority, an option she considers a risk of permanent instability.
“I did my best. And we had come a long way. We were in the home straight”, said the chancellor after the abrupt exit of the talks to form the government of the FDP Liberal Party, which left the country shocked and the political world as after an earthquake. If there are elections,”I will be available again,” said Merkel, who will remain in office until there is a new executive.
Her worst moments as the leader of Germany
Although in other countries with a parliamentary system it is common for government formation to be delayed or to be governed by a minority, for Germany the current situation implies the worst political crisis since 1949. Never before has a party that had won the elections failed to form a government. And no one knows yet what solution there will be. I now give the floor to the chairman, Frank-Walter Steinmeier. We are in a situation that has never existed in the history of the Federal Republic of Germany in almost 70 years,”Steinmeier recalled today, who has the power to approve a minority government or dissolve the parliament and call new elections.
The head of state met with Merkel today and called on the leaders of the other forces (morning, The Greens, and Wednesday, the Social Democrats) to converse in search of a way out of the crisis. Steinmeier’s words seemed to be directed primarily at his Social Democratic Party (SPD, whose leaders today repeated that they were unwilling to re-edit the current coalition (in interim government) with Merkel’s CDU, in what would be the easiest way out of the current mess. Martin Schulz’s SPD obtained a historically poor result in September, with only 21 percent of the vote, which led him to the opposition.
The emergence of new political forces is making it increasingly difficult to form solid alliances with stable majorities in Germany. In the current Parliament, there are six benches, including that of the ultra-right-wing Alternative for Germany (AfD), with which nobody wants to govern, and also the post-communists of the Left, who, although they have been involved in regional executives for years, are not seen as a possible partner at the federal level, especially because of their foreign policy positions, such as their criticisms of NATO.