In his bid to become the country’s 10th chancellor, Friedrich Merz, leader of Germany’s conservative Christian Democratic Union (CDU), has failed by falling short by six votes in the first round of voting in parliament.
Merz, who had been widely expected to win the parliamentary vote, needed 316 votes in the secret ballot held on Tuesday, but he received only 310.
The failure to win the required majority means that the political parties will now regroup to discuss the next steps.
It is an embarrassment for Merz as no candidate for German chancellor had ever failed to secure an absolute majority in the first round of voting.
Read also: Germany seizes Russian ‘shadow fleet’ ship
The Bundestag, Germany’s lower house of parliament, has 14 days to elect a chancellor, either Merz or another candidate, who will need an outright majority.
CDU, CSU led by Merz
The conservative alliance of CDU and Christian Social Union (CSU), led by Merz, had topped the polls in the national elections in February with 28.5 per cent of the vote, but it still required at least one coalition partner to form a majority government.
On Monday, the CDU/CSU reached an agreement with the centre-left Social Democratic Party (SPD), which secured 16.4 per cent in the elections after the collapse of Olaf Scholz’s government last year.
If the vote were to pass, the CDU/CSU-SPD coalition would have a slim majority, with just 328 seats in the Bundestag out of a total of 630.
Also, within the CDU/CSU and SPD blocs, 10 members failed to attend the vote, three abstained, and several voted against Merz “despite the official steer” of their parties.
It comes as the newly formed coalition had set ambitious goals, including stimulating economic growth, boosting defence spending, and tightening immigration policies in response to the far-right Alternative für Germany (AfD), which came second in the vote.
