Berlin – The selfie of confidence popped on the nation’s cell phones on Wednesday night. Four familiar faces smile to the world on the social media channel Instagram. Volker Wissing and Robert Habeck outside, Annalena Baerbock and Christian Lindner in their midst. The photo is followed by the following lines: “In search of a new government, we sound out similarities and bridges across divisions. And even find some. Exciting times ”. In this way, the FDP and the Greens communicate at the same time and with the same words on four channels that they are getting closer to each other. Everything else remains a mystery until well into Wednesday.
It is quite an unusual spectacle what can be observed there at the moment. The four top people of the most likely new governing parties, the FDP and the Greens, met. That’s what this photo says. And nothing else! You neither know what exactly they were talking about nor what came of it. Whether there are points of contention, differences, suggestions on how to overcome them. Because even the day after, there is no information on the part of the party.
Talks on Friday, Saturday and Sunday
The secrecy just goes on. In the early Wednesday afternoon, FDP General Secretary Volker Wissing appeared in front of the press. But he did not want to say anything about the content of the conversation the previous evening, nor about the place and duration. Confidentiality is agreed. Wissing also announced that the FDP had agreed to another meeting with the Greens for Friday, an invitation from the Union for Saturday and an invitation from the SPD on Sunday had been accepted. The Greens will also speak to the SPD on Sunday. There is no appointment for a meeting with the Union. You send a team of ten to exploratory talks. About content: still nothing.
SPD chancellor candidate Olaf Scholz spoke again on Wednesday for a traffic light coalition of the SPD, FDP and the Greens. There are many similarities, he affirmed. Scholz wants to prevent the Greens and FDP from opting for Jamaica rounds with the Union after all. “In his situation, Armin Laschet makes all the concessions to the two parties, only to become Chancellor of the Union after all,” says one comrade.
Allegedly, Scholz is said to have called back the opponents in his own party, who had increasingly poisoned against the Greens and the FDP in recent times. These include the left Kevin Kühnert and the party leaders Norbert Walter-Borjans and Saskia Esken, who have been teasing the FDP and Greens since the election. This is seen as an imposition, especially among the liberals. Advertising looks different to them.
The fact that it does not look like an SPD-FDP love marriage so far was already evident on Tuesday evening, when SPD General Secretary Lars Klingbeil and Marie-Agnes Strack-Zimmermann from the FDP were sitting with Markus Lanz. The politician called the SPD man Kevin Kühnert, who had called FDP leader Christian Lindner “Luftikus” during the election campaign, as “not the brightest candle on the social democratic cake”. And Klingbeil complained that FDP politician Wolfgang Kubicki had called Karl Lauterbach “Spacko”. But the post-election labor pains should now be over – because, according to the SPD, they want to negotiate sensibly.
As expected, the SPD confirmed its parliamentary group leader Rolf Mützenich on Wednesday. This time he spoke very moderately in the direction of the “two small parties”. He hoped for common sense and constructive discussions. Looking at the selfies, he reacted quite offended: “Germany doesn’t need photos, it needs a government.”
Slogans to hold out to the Union
The chairman of the Junge Union, Tilman Kuban, spoke to the Union on Wednesday and called for the party to be renewed. No stone should be left unturned in the Union, he told the RND. In the group meeting on Tuesday, he had avoided criticism. Apparently it was mainly women who spoke openly about the party’s plight. The outgoing MP Sylvia Pantel sharply criticized the election campaign. The deputy group leader Gitta Connemann asked several times who would take responsibility. Apparently she got no answer. Many participants did not dare to say anything, especially since the federal ministers present had issued slogans for perseverance, it said. “We don’t have a good culture of debate right now,” said a participant in the Berliner Zeitung.
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