The evening sun shines on the Reichstag building of the German Bundestag with the inscription “Dem Deutschen Volke.
Fabian Sommer | Photo alliance | Getty images
Berlin – The Democratic Christian Union and the Allied Christian Social Union obtained the largest share of votes in the German federal elections on Sunday, according to the surveys of exit from the German diffuser ZDF.
This puts the main candidate of the Friedrich Merz party in a privileged position to take over from Olaf Scholz as Chancellor of the greatest European economy.
The CDU-CSU won 28.5% of the votes, with far-right AFD in second place with 20% and Scholz’s social democratic party in the third with 16.5%, according to data from the surveys of ZDF.
“We won it because the CDU and the CSU worked well together and we have prepared very well for this election and also for having taken control of responsibility,” said Merz, according to a translation of the CNBC, thanking CSU chief, Markus Söder and other supporters. “It was a big campaign.”
He admitted that the challenges would not be easy to take up, noting that it was now time for political groups to hold talks and set up a new government as soon as possible.
“It is a bitter electoral result for the social democratic party. It is also an electoral defeat, [and] I think it must be said once clear, from the start, given a result like this, “said Scholz at the party’s seat, when he thanked the militants and the supporters. He said he had taken responsibilities during the previous federal vote, when the SPD achieved better performance and that “this time the result of the elections is bad and I therefore also have the responsibility of this electoral result”.
Scholz also congratulated Merz and the CDU-CSU for their own voting results.
The CDU and its regional sister party, the Christian Social Union, was at the top of the surveys in the contribution of the elections, with support slightly before the vote. AFD on the far right was in second place, followed by the SPD.
This marked a drop in support for the SPD, which took first place during the 2021 Election, followed by CDU / CSU. AFD won fourth place at the time.
The Germans expressed two voices on Sunday, one to elect a deputy directly to represent their constituency and one for a list of parties. The second vote determined the proportional composition of the German Parliament, the Bundestag, the parties sending their candidates to Berlin to ensure the representation.
The parties must also reach a 5% threshold to be able to collect seats in Parliament. Above all, the groups that tend to ensure around this level of votes often become so-called manufacturers of royals in the construction of the coalition after the elections.
A key objective around the elections was the way in which the small parties are carried out, which could have an impact on the construction of the coalition and the capacity of the government entering to reform the constitutional rules, for example around expenses and debt . They would need a two -thirds majority to do so.
The observers also looked closely at AFD’s performance in the far right in the middle of a broader political change through the Western world.
The election arrives at a tumultuous moment for Germany, both politically and economically.
Sunday vote is only the fourth early election in the history of the country and took place after the former coalition in power composed of the SPD, the Green Party and the Libre Democratic Party has collapsed at the end of Last year, in another rarity for local policy. Long -term disagreements deeply rooted among economic, budgetary and budgetary policies had led to the effective bursting of the union.
Such policies will also be at the top of the agenda with regard to the process of building the post-electoral coalition, then governance, in particular because of the slow German economy, which contracted in 2023 and 2024. Exports, a crisis in building houses and difficulties in the key automotive sector.
The new ruling coalition will also have to face a fierce inner debate on migration, the growing popularity of the far right and broader tensions between Europe and the United States while President Donald Trump advances his business and his Ukrainian war policies in his second term.
