There’s a chance German SPD only needs Greens to rule: Odendahl

Germany’s Social Democrats may not need a three-way coalition to oust Chancellor Angela Merkel’s conservative bloc from power in the Sept. 26 federal election, according to Christian Odendahl, chief economist at independent think-tank Centre for European Reform.

With the Left Party coming “dangerously close” to the 5%-threshold, below which parties in Germany are excluded from parliamentary representation, the odds of the SPD being able to govern just with the Green Party may depend on how the Left fares in Berlin’s East, Odendahl says in a Twitter thread.