Germany's embattled Scholz open to talks on early election
· CNA · JoinBERLIN: German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, mired in crisis after his three-party coalition collapsed this week, said Friday (Nov 8) he is open to talks on whether to move forward with snap elections.
The embattled chancellor has signalled new polls by March - half a year earlier than scheduled - but all opposition parties have urgently demanded they be held as early as January to restore stability.
Two-thirds of German voters agree a survey showed, demanding a new government quickly at a time when Germany faces deep economic woes and geopolitical volatility.
Germany's crisis erupted Wednesday, just as Donald Trump won the White House race with as yet unknown consequences for transatlantic trade and the wars in Ukraine and the Middle East.
Scholz's political rivals have threatened to block his minority government from passing laws unless he immediately asks for a confidence vote that would allow for a speedy election.
But Scholz threw the ball back into their court by demanding they first help him pass key legislation, in a message aimed chiefly at the CDU/CSU conservative opposition.
Speaking in his trademark unruffled tone on the sidelines of an EU summit in Budapest, Scholz urged a "calm debate" first among parliamentary groups on what laws can be passed this year.
This "could help answer the question of when the right time is" for a confidence vote leading to an early election, he said.
He added that "the election date is not a purely political" decision but must also "allow sufficient time for the organisation of a fair and democratic election".
"CLEAR THE WAY"
In Berlin, the debate was anything but calm.
The conservative opposition seems to have rejected Scholz's offer of talks out of hand.
"First the vote of confidence, then we can talk about issues," conservative MP Alexander Dobrindt told the Rheinische Post newspaper.
The popular Bild daily called for Scholz to "clear the way" for a new government.
"You, Mr Scholz, have tried and failed," Bild editor Marion Horn wrote in a blistering commentary. "Let us voters reassign the mandate of power ... as quickly as possible."
Some 65 per cent of German voters agreed, while just 33 percent supported Scholz's more relaxed timeline, according to a survey for public broadcaster ARD.
The coalition crisis, centred on discord over economic and fiscal policy, came to a head when Scholz sacked his rebellious finance minister Christian Lindner of the Free Democrats.
It has reduced the government to Scholz's Social Democrats and the Greens.
Scholz also drew fire from unexpected quarters this week when US tech billionaire and Trump ally Elon Musk in a short German-language message on X labelled him a "Narr", or a fool.
Asked about the comment, a tight-lipped Scholz simply called it "not very friendly" and said that internet companies are "not organs of state, so I did not pay it any attention".
PATS ON "BACK"
With the end of the Scholz government in sight, German politicians have quickly moved into campaign mode.
The frontrunner in the polls is Friedrich Merz, the head of the conservative CDU party of ex-leader Angela Merkel.
Lindner, the man at the centre of the storm, meanwhile said he wants to be finance minister again in the next government.
Scholz also wants to run again, but a Forsa poll said he has only 13 per cent support against 57 per cent for his long-popular defence minister, Boris Pistorius.
Speaking in Budapest, Scholz said that many European leaders sympathised with his plight in the messy world of shifting party alliances.
"Many have patted me on the back," he told the press briefing. "Many have experience of coalition governments.
"They know that it will not get easier but increasingly difficult - not only in Germany but also in many other countries. Some have known this for decades."
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