The centre-left Social Democrats (SPD) were on track for 26.0% of the vote, ahead of 24.5% for Merkel’s CDU/CSU conservative bloc, projections for broadcaster ZDF showed, but both groups believed they could lead the next government. Agreeing a new coalition could take months, and will likely involve the smaller Greens and liberal Free Democrats (FDP). “We are ahead in all the surveys now,” the Social Democrats’ chancellor candidate, Olaf Scholz , said in a round table discussion with other candidates after the vote. Scholz, 63, would become the fourth post-war SPD chancellor after Willy Brandt, Helmut Schmidt and Gerhard Schroeder. Schmidt ruled in the late 1970s and early 1980s in coalition with the FDP even though his Social Democrats had fewer parliamentary seats than the conservative bloc.

Source: Philippine Daily Inquirer September 26, 2021 20:48 UTC