After the election: breakthrough in explorations to form a government in Berlin

After laborious negotiations and some ups and downs, the exploratory talks in Berlin have reached their goal. The Left, the Greens and the SPD are taking an important step towards a coalition.

After successful coalition negotiations, the Left could move into the Red City Hall in Berlin for the first time with its top candidate Elif Eralp.

Berlin. Four weeks after the election to the Berlin House of Representatives, the Left, the Greens and the SPD have successfully concluded their exploratory talks about forming a government. The German Press Agency learned from circles of all three parties involved that the party committees are now being proposed to start coalition negotiations.

The Greens want to decide on this at a small party conference this Monday. In the case of the SPD, the state executive board is likely to decide on the basis of the exploratory paper; a date was not initially given.

Due to the two-week autumn break in Berlin, the Left has only scheduled a party conference for October 31st, which will decide on the start of coalition negotiations. If all three parties agree, these could start at the beginning of November.

The Left, the Greens and the SPD invited people to a joint press statement at the House of Statistics in Berlin-Mitte at 5 p.m. According to dpa information, they want to provide information about the exploratory paper and the next steps.

The explorations started on Thursday last week. The three parties previously reached an agreement on how they would deal with anti-Semitic incidents in the ranks of the left in the event of a coalition. Sanctions up to and including exclusion from the parliamentary group are also being considered. Against the background of several incidents on the Left, the Greens and the SPD made this agreement a prerequisite for the start of exploratory investigations.

In the Berlin election on September 20th, the Left was the strongest force with 25.7 percent. They are followed by the CDU (18.8 percent), AfD (16.3 percent), the Greens (14.3 percent) and - with their historically worst result - the SPD (12.1 percent). The previously ruling CDU/SPD coalition has lost its majority.

The desired three-party coalition of the Left, the Greens and the SPD would have 91 seats in the new Berlin House of Representatives, which would be 14 more than the absolute majority. A coalition of the CDU, the Greens and the SPD would also be possible, although the number of mandates would only be two seats above the absolute majority.