Deutsche Presse-Agentur, the German news agency, has ruled that the new expected coalition between the conservative CDU/CSU union and the Social Democratic party will no longer qualify as a “grand coalition”, or GroKo, as it was known in Angela Merkel years.
![[German conservative candidate for chancellor and Christian Democratic Union (CDU) party leader Friedrich Merz attends a press conference following the general election in Berlin.]](https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/50172a0e83f8a855c241b5c549b6c687278b6a44/0_565_5914_3548/master/5914.jpg?width=465&dpr=1&s=none&crop=none)
This is to account for the reality that the two are no longer the largest parties in the new Bundestag – with the far-right Alternative für Deutschland now the second largest, ahead of the SPD, after the elections on Sunday. So, the hunt is on for a new name. Building on a slightly unusual tradition of naming coalitions by references to other countries’ flags, first suggestions were to call it “the Albanian coalition” or “the Angolan coalition” (black and red are the colours of the two parties, although in both cases there are some, erm, additional elements on their flags, too), but in more unusual ideas someone said it could be the “Coke Zero” coalition, too. “Real taste and zero calories”. Any other ideas?.
As entertaining as it is, finding an informal nickname for the new coalition is probably going to be the least important of their problems. With parliamentary party groups meeting for the first time since election today, the countdown to Easter, when chancellor-in-waiting Friedrich Merz said he would want to have his government in place by, starts now.
