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ARTICLE · 12 DECEMBER 2024

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German Federal Government Breaks-up – New Elections Ahead

A&O Shearman
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Olaf Scholz has proposed federal elections to take place in March or April 2025. The leader of the opposition, Friedrich Merz, is pushing for federal elections already in January 2025.

GermanyGovernment, Public Sector
Udo Herbert Olgemöller
Udo Herbert Olgemöller
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Olaf Scholz has proposed federal elections to take place in March or April 2025. The leader of the opposition, Friedrich Merz, is pushing for federal elections already in January 2025. Considering the more recent outcome of elections at German state level, it might take some more weeks to negotiate a coalition between different political parties. Against that background, it might take until the end of Q1 or Q2 in 2025 that a new German government actually takes office.

Interim phase

Until a new German parliament will have been elected and a new German government will have taken office, the current government will remain in office and be entitled to continue governing Germany; however, any decision to be approved by the German parliament will depend on ad-hoc majorities that the government will have find on a case-by-case (or: law-by-law) basis given that the remaining government can no longer rely on a coalition-based – aoshearman.com and thus reliable – majority

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