German delegates took to the polls to elect the country’s next president, following the surprise resignation of Horst Koehler at the end of May. And although Chancellor Angela Merkel’s preferred candidate won, the consequences of the election are sure to be felt for the next several months.
Despite the relative unimportance of the (largely ceremonial) position, the election was closely watched across Europe because it served as a referendum on Merkel’s tenuous ruling coalition, which has come under increasing fire for its fiscal austerity measures. Although results were expected to fall largely along party lines, the fact that the election took three rounds to complete was an embarrassment to a leader with a comfortable majority – and certainly signals deeper problems in the center-right alliance of Merkel’s Christian Democratic Union/ Christian Social Union and the Free Democratic Party.
