Carsten Brzeski – Chief Economist at ING, notes the aftershocks of the European elections and regional votes in Bremen continue to affect German politics, increasing the risk of snap elections.
Key Quotes
“The German government hasn’t only lost further electoral support since the 2017 elections, unrest in both coalition partners has also increased. Developments since the European elections have made the fall of the government before the 2021 elections more likely. With the recent successes of the Greens, any fall of the government would, in our view, lead to snap elections, not just a simple reshuffling of coalition partners. The Greens have become too strong to simply go into a government with the CDU as a small junior partner. According to the latest polls, the CDU and Greens could almost form a government of near equals.”
“The only upside to the latest developments is that Angela Merkel’s position has actually strengthened. This is simply because she remains firm as a rock and is currently probably the only tower of stability for the government, both internationally and domestically. However, this stability will definitely be over by 2021 as Merkel never tires of emphasising that she will not run for another term in office, nor for any European job. In any case, watch this space. German politics has probably never been more exciting than it is now and there are more turbulent times ahead.”
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