Germany’s Merkel voted in for third term

Angela Merkel is elected to a third term as chancellor in a vote in the German lower house of parliament on Tuesday, paving the way for her new “grand coalition” government to be sworn in and formally take power later in the day, according to the Voice of Russia.

 Merkel’s conservatives scored their best result in over two decades in a German election on September 22 but were forced into lengthy coalition talks with the rival Social Democrats (SPD), whose members only approved the deal last weekend.

The vote in the Bundestag was a formality as the ruling parties hold an overwhelming majority of the seats. A total of 462 lawmakers backed Merkel for chancellor, with 150 voting against and 9 abstaining.

The new government faces a host of challenges, from bedding down European reforms aimed at shielding the bloc from future crises, to seeing through Merkel’s costly switch from nuclear to renewable energy.

Merkel joins fellow conservatives Konrad Adenauer and Helmut Kohl as the only post-war chancellors to have won three terms.

German state of Hesse agrees conservative-green coalition deal

The German state of Hesse’s centre-right Christian Democrats and its environmentalist Green Party finalized a coalition agreement on Tuesday, just as the country’s nationwide grand coalition government was being sworn in.

The deal marks the first time in Germany’s history that the conservative Christian Democratic Union (CDU) and the centre-left Greens have agreed to govern jointly in a larger state.

There has been one such coalition previously at a city-state level.

The two parties have been in coalition talks since November 22, two months after the regional election in the central German state took place.

The vote coincided with Germany’s nationwide election.

Party leaders Volker Bouffier (CDU) and Tarek Al-Wazir (Green Party) are set to present the coalition agreement to their members on Wednesday.

The only other CDU-Green coalition to have existed in Germany came into force in the city-state of Hamburg in 2008, with the parties breaking off the alliance two years into the term.

Merkel is due to be sworn on Tuesday

Angela Merkel is due to be sworn on Tuesday for a rare third term as German chancellor, capping months of political uncertainty as she bartered with her rivals to help govern Europe’s top economy.

H. Mustafa