German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s Christian Democrats (CDU) on Monday ruled out the possibility of entering a grand coalition with their centre-left rivals in Schleswig-Holstein, one day after beating the Social Democrats (SPD) in the northern German state.
Daniel Guenther, the CDU candidate in the strongly Protestant state, said that after such a crushing defeat, the SPD cannot be part of any future coalition because it would send the wrong signal to voters.
Merkel’s CDU won 32.0 per cent of the vote, while the SPD which currently governs the state in a coalition with the Greens and Der Südschleswigsche Wählerverband., a regional party that represents the Danish and Frisian minorities, won just 27.2 per cent of the vote.
It is a strategically important win for Merkel, who is running for a fourth term in office in September’s general election. (dpa/NAN)