German Chancellor Olaf Scholz announced on Sunday, the 10th of November, his readiness to hold a confidence vote in parliament before Christmas to speed up possible snap elections after the collapse of his three-party coalition, in response to growing pressure from both politicians and the public to move faster to bring stability to the government, reports Reuters.
Europe’s biggest economy was in chaos last week as Scholz’s coalition collapsed, and disagreements emerged over how much money the government should spend to boost growth and support Ukraine.
“I’m not clinging to my job,” he said in an interview with ARD television.
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, who initially proposed a confidence vote on the 15th of January and possible early elections in March, faced mounting pressure on Sunday from the conservative opposition and coalition partners to hold a confidence vote sooner.
Green Party leaders Anton Hofreiter and Irene Mihalic, the most vocal of the two parties still in power, publicly called for a vote in December, joining calls by opposition leader Friedrich Merz, who advocates snap elections as early as January. A confidence vote is a prerequisite for elections.
Scholz said in an interview with ARD that an earlier confidence vote would depend on whether Rolf Muetzenich of the SPD and Merz of the opposition reached an agreement on the timing.
“I have no problem with a confidence vote before Christmas,” he said.
Scholz on Friday demanded a peaceful debate between Germany’s warring factions on setting an early election date to get the country out of the political crisis.
Scholz called on the parties to first agree on what legislation could be passed in the current parliament but denied that by postponing the elections he was trying to advance his own political agenda.