Germany’s leader Friedrich Merz stunned after losing secret leadership election — a post-World War II first

Germany’s new chancellor suffered a major blow before his term even began — after dramatically losing a secret leadership election.

Friedrich Merz is the first leader to suffer such a defeat since the end of World War II.

The conservative politician needed a second attempt to secure the endorsement of Germany’s parliament after failing to gain enough support in the initial ballot to command a majority. 

At least a dozen members of Merz’s proposed coalition failed to back him in the first vote on Tuesday, making him the first post-war German leader to require a second ballot.

The vote is secret, and therefore it isn’t yet known who voted against Merz from among his party.

It comes after Merz’s Christian Democratic Union (CDU) secured a 12-seat majority in March’s German elections, seeing off the challenge from Alternative für Deutschland (AfD), the party accused by many of having ties to neo-Nazi groups.

The AfD has been leading in some pre-election polls.

“This is dramatic,” the head of the Forsa polling group, Manfred Gullner, told the Wall Street Journal, adding that Merz’s credibility as leader of Europe’s biggest economy has been damaged.

“Trust in politicians and the government is already low and this won’t help to reestablish it,” added Ursula Munch, director of the Academy for Political Education in Tutzing, in the south of Germany.

The AfD has seized on the news as a sign that the new government lacks legitimacy.

“This government was started as unstable and it will remain unstable,” AfD lawmaker Bernd Baumann told reporters shortly before the second vote. “That is the last thing the country needs.”