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Polling stations have opened in Germany as the nation decides who will succeed in the race to replace Angela Merkel as chancellor after 16 years.
As the latest rallies were held across the country by leading candidates on Saturday, polls showing Social Democrats Olaf Scholz’s lead over Christian Democrats’ Armin Laschet narrowed to a tiny margin, the Voter turnout among the more than 60 million Germans with the right to vote was estimated to be high.
The Greens, led by Annalena Baerbock, who at one point led the polls, were on their way to securing third place and are expected to find themselves in government for the first time since 2005.
The departure of Merkel – the first outgoing chancellor not to stand for re-election since World War II, has made the competition much more volatile and incalculable than ever. It was still believed that large numbers of Germans were undecided, even in the hours leading up to election day.
Due to the pandemic, around 40% – a record number – of voters have already voted by mail.
Frank-Walter Steinmeier, the president, said Germany was facing a “political transition” and urged citizens to use their votes to determine “how the country continues to deal with the big and small issues of our time” .
“Democracy is nourished by intervention and participation. The participants will be heard. Those who do not vote allow others to decide for them, ”he wrote in a guest commentary for the tabloid Bild am Sontag.
The climate emergency was a key topic during the campaign, with activists at Fridays for Future protests across the country on Friday calling on a new government to put tackling the global climate crisis high on its agenda. . Before the polls opened, two remaining activists from a group that had been on hunger strike at a neighboring Bundestag camp since August 30 called off their strike after Scholz agreed to a public meeting with them in four weeks .
Polling stations opened at 88,000 polling stations across the country at 8 a.m. and will close at 6 p.m., with the first exit polls due to be released at the same time.
The leading candidates are to organize at 8:15 pm local time an “Elephant Round”, a live televised debate on the future composition of the government.
But clarity is not expected even after the end results are known. A coalition government is inevitable, but for the first time in more than seven decades it is expected to be made up of three parties, which will result in months of complicated and heated negotiations between them.
Merkel will remain in office in a custodial role until the new government takes power, which could take weeks or even months.
The party that obtains the best result will not automatically lead the government but will have to woo the latter to join them in power. The Green Party, which previously shared power with the Social Democrats in the national government, is expected to be a key kingmaker, alongside the pro-business Free Democratic Party (FDP), which has traditionally been a natural partner of the conservative alliance.
The most likely coalitions are:
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A coalition of traffic lights – reflecting the distinctive colors of the parties – between the SPD, the Greens and the FDP.
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A Jamaican alliance (the party colors match those of the Jamaican flag) made up of the CDU / CSU, the Greens and the FDP.
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Or a so-called “Red-Red-Green” coalition between the SPD, the Greens and the extreme left Die Linke.
In the German proportional representation system, each voter has two votes. The first is for a direct candidate in one of the 299 constituencies which gives each constituency parliamentary representation.
The second vote is for a party and determines the composition of the Bundestag.
Parties must obtain 5% of the vote in order to enter the Bundestag.
The size of the future parliament will only be determined at the end of the votes, after adjustment to take into account the difference between the number of directly elected representatives and the results of the second vote.
But due to the number of direct candidates on their way to winning, the Bundestag is expected to drop from the current record of 709 seats to 900. Election analysts have predicted a “horror scenario” that will not just be one challenge for those who have to organize the furniture but lead to an explosion of costs as well as to complicate parliamentary business.
Under the new rules, among those eligible to vote for the first time, 85,000 people with disabilities will be allowed to enter the voting booth accompanied by a legal guardian.
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