A day after Donald Trump’s historic comeback as US President had the world stunned, political chaos has surfaced far away in Europe. Germany’s ruling coalition collapsed after Chancellor Olaf Scholz sacked his finance minister Christian Lindner on November 8.
Germany's ruling coalition collapsed as Chancellor Olaf Scholz sacked his finance minister Christian Lindner and paved the way for a snap election, triggering political chaos in Europe's largest economy https://t.co/bDntnHhX24 pic.twitter.com/HOh59QGVhg
— Reuters Asia (@ReutersAsia) November 7, 2024
Olaf Scholz is now leading a government that has lost its majority. The minority government under Scholz is supported by the social democrats and the Greens. Snap elections are likely to follow soon.
The coalition government was reportedly facing policy paralysis due to the different political stands of coalition parties. The government coalition headed by Scholz was referred to as the ‘traffic light coalition’ in German media due to the glaring differences of the parties.
The coalition government was already under a lot of pressure due to Germany’s stagnant economy, and energy crisis triggered by the Ukraine war. To make matters worse, many of the Scholz government’s budget policies were rejected by the Federal Constitutional Court. One of the largest setbacks was the Court’s ruling that the allocation of $60 billion from pandemic relief funds to climate funds was ‘unconstitutional’.
