Germany’s conservative leader Friedrich Merz unexpectedly fell short of a majority in a parliament vote to become chancellor on Tuesday.
His failure was unprecedented in modern German political history and members of the Bundestag convened for a second vote on Tuesday afternoon.
Merz needed 316 votes in the 630-seat Bundestag but only secured 310, in a significant blow to the Christian Democrat leader, two and a half months after winning Germany’s federal elections.
His coalition with the centre left has enough seats in parliament but it appears 18 MPs who had been expected to back him dissented.
Under Germany’s constitution, there is no limit to how many votes can be held, but if no absolute majority of more than half the Bundestag’s members is reached within 14 days, then a candidate can be elected by a simple majority.
There was a prevailing mood of confusion in the parliament in the hours after the vote.
Bundestag President Julia Klöckner was initially said to be planning a second vote on Wednesday, but Christian Democrat General Secretary Carsten Linnemann said it was important to press ahead.
“Europe needs a strong Germany, that’s why we can’t wait for days,” he told German TV.
Parliamentary group leader Jens Spahn appealed to his colleagues’ sense of responsibility: “all of Europe, perhaps the whole world, is watching this ballot.”
Merz’s defeat was seen by political commentators as a humiliation, possibly inflicted by a handful of disaffected members of the Social Democrat SPD, which signed a coalition deal with his conservatives on Monday.
The Bundestag president told MPs that nine of the 630 MPs were absent, three abstained and another ballot paper was declared invalid.
