German election: SPD under pressure to rejoin Merkel in forming grand coalition

After tri-party coalition talks among incumbent German Chancellor’s Christian Democratic Union (CDU), its sister Party Christian Social Union (CSU), Free Democrats (FDP), and the Greens broke down last weekend with an abrupt pull out by the FDP leader Christian Linder threatening the fourth term of Merkel as chancellor, Germany’s main opposition party Social Democrats (SPD) is under pressure to join Angela Merkel once again in forming a grand coalition government.

After allying with Merkel’s CDU in forming the previous government, SPD leader Martin Schultz announced that his party will not be joining Merkel this time around and will be sitting in the parliament as opposition. Even after the breakdown of the tri-party coalition talks, Mr. Schultz said that he would not be revisiting his decision.

However, the President of Germany, Frank- Walter Steinmeier has now reportedly intervened in order to break the political stalemate between the SPD and CDU/CSU. Mr. Steinmeier, who is a former SPD foreign minister has said that he wants to avoid a fresh election and urged party leaders to restart negotiations. He met with the SPD leader Mr. Schultz at the Presidential palace in Berlin. While there was no official statement released after the meeting, it is well-believed that he urged Mr. Schultz to revisit his decision.

If a deal can’t be reached within the next three weeks, a re-election will be very much likely.