BERLIN: Germany’s conservatives led by election winner Friedrich Merz opened talks Friday with the Social Democrats (SPD) on swiftly forming a coalition as Berlin faces multiple challenges at home and abroad.
“Both sides have to make concessions,“ said Manuela Schwesig of Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s SPD as the exploratory talks began in Berlin.
“Everyone has to pull together and make an effort,“ added Schwesig, state premier of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania.
Merz’s CDU/CSU alliance won Sunday’s elections with 28.6 percent of the vote, while the SPD scored a historic low of 16.4 percent.
Merz, 69, has said he wants a ruling coalition in place within two months of the vote, by the Easter holiday.
However, both sides will have to resolve key differences on thorny issues from immigration to how to balance a tight budget.
Germany was plunged into political crisis in November when Scholz’s three-way coalition with the Greens and the liberal FDP collapsed after months of infighting.
“We have to learn from this failed government,“ Schwesig said. “Constant conflict harms not only those involved, but also democracy.”
The exploratory talks are intended to sound out the possibilities for cooperation and, if fruitful, would lead to full coalition talks.
Such talks often drag on for weeks if not months in Germany, spelling long stretches of political paralysis before a new chancellor takes charge.
But Merz is in a hurry to reach a deal as soon as possible as Europe’s biggest economy faces multiple challenges, including economic malaise and a major upheaval in relations with the United States under President Donald Trump.
“The world isn’t waiting for us,“ Merz said after Sunday’s election win.
Merz has ruled out working with the far-right and anti-immigration Alternative for Germany (AfD), which came second in the election with a record score of over 20 percent.
That leaves the SPD as his only politically feasible option to form a government.
It would be the fourth time since the turn of the millennium and the fifth time in Germany’s post-war history that the parties have governed together in a so-called grand coalition — always under the leadership of the CDU/CSU.
