CDU General Secretary Mario Czaja expects a black-green coalition after the state elections in North Rhine-Westphalia. The CDU and the Greens emerged from the election as clear winners, said Czaja on Monday in the ZDF “Morgenmagazin”. “And the formation of a coalition will now also go in this direction.”
It is now important to reconcile the economy and progress with the issue of climate and ecology. “That is the task of this government, in such difficult times. In an industrialized country like North Rhine-Westphalia, this can work well under the leadership of Hendrik Wüst.” At the same time, he criticized the SPD’s considerations of starting coalition talks.
The FDP’s top candidate, Joachim Stamp, is also firmly assuming that there will be a coalition between the CDU and the Greens. When asked about the chances of a coalition of SPD, Greens and FDP, Stamp said on Monday morning on WDR 5: “The question doesn’t arise, it’s going to be black and green now.” ‘ said the Liberal. It would never do any good to rule out cooperation in principle. A traffic light is not up for debate.
According to the provisional official final result, the CDU under Prime Minister Wüst achieved 35.7 percent in the election on Sunday. The Greens came to 18.2 percent. A two-party coalition is therefore considered likely. Mathematically, an alliance of the SPD with the Greens and FDP would also be possible, based on the example of the traffic light coalition in the federal government.
The SPD’s top candidate, Thomas Kutschaty, emphasized that he wants to continue to take on government responsibility. “In any case, we are also ready for talks,” said Kutschaty on Monday to broadcaster WDR 5. The social democrat emphasized that there were “many large intersections” between the Greens and his party, more so than with the CDU. “That’s why you have to see what goes well together in terms of programming and who can then form the government.”
However, with a view to a possible traffic light coalition in Düsseldorf, Kutschaty conceded that three-party alliances are more difficult to forge than two-party alliances. “I’m not fooling myself.”
SPD General Secretary Kevin Kühnert also sees a chance for an SPD-led government. “I have to say that Mr. Wüst can only form a majority with parties that have passionately criticized him from the opposition for five years, for too little speed in the expansion of renewable energies, for too little commitment to affordable housing, for too high a daycare center fees and much more,” said the SPD general secretary. “And he’ll have to explain that in the next few weeks and he’ll have to show ways of coming together.”
Kühnert does not automatically see the reasons for the poor performance of the Social Democrats in North Rhine-Westphalia at the federal level. “I would not accept the thesis that this state election result would now be a confirmation or refutation of the policy of the federal government,” Kühnert told Bayerischer Rundfunk on Monday.
But Kühnert also admitted that his party made mistakes in the election campaign. “We could have been even clearer in the escalation that it can really be a close decision in the end,” said Kühnert on Monday in the ZDF morning magazine. At the same time, Kühnert rejected the fact that the historically poor SPD result was also a vote on Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s (SPD) policy.
Kühnert emphasized that federal politics had overshadowed state issues in the election campaign, at the same time he said that Scholz had received a lot of encouragement. “Of course, federal political issues overlaid this election campaign – unfortunately one has to say – it was little about local state politics,” he said. War and uncertainty about the “galloping price development” played a major role.
“I haven’t seen people draw the conclusion from this: They can do it and they can’t.” After an election like this, there is always a longing for it to become very clear what the mistake in Berlin is. “But I also experienced a lot of encouragement about the Chancellor’s policy in Ukraine.”
