Some FDP politicians want out of the Berlin government. But most of the party’s voters see it differently. Only a special group is frustrated by traffic lights.
After the recent election defeats and poor survey results, some FDP politicians are calling for them to leave the coalition in Berlin. A Forsa survey for the star However, the majority of FDP voters – as well as a majority of Germans as a whole – are in favor of the Liberals remaining in the traffic light government.
Only 29 percent of FDP voters are in favor of ending the coalition, 68 percent are in favor of continuing the alliance, three percent express no opinion. Among Germans as a whole, 38 percent are in favor of breaking the government, 52 percent are against it, and ten percent have no opinion.
A majority of FDP voters in 2021 are in favor of cancellation
The picture changes somewhat if you ask those who voted for the FDP in the last federal election. At that time the party had achieved 11.5 percent. The Liberals are currently polling between four and six percent, meaning they would lose half to two thirds of the vote. Of the 2021 voters, 45 percent are in favor of breaking up the coalition, 55 percent are in favor of remaining in the government. Among the self-employed, who belong to the liberal clientele, there is a stalemate: 48 percent each for stopping or continuing the traffic light.
Manfred Güllner, head of the Forsa Institute, interprets the numbers as follows: “The fact that almost half of the FDP voters in the 2021 federal election and also the self-employed – actually the core electorate of the Liberals – advise the FDP to leave the traffic light coalition shows that how dissatisfied large parts of the middle class are with the work of the FDP in the government, through which the interests of the middle class have apparently not been represented to the extent hoped for.”
The data was collected by the market and opinion research institute forsa for RTL Group Germany on November 2nd and 3rd, 2023. Database: 1006 respondents. Statistical margin of error: +/- 3 percentage points.
Source: Stern
I have been working in the news industry for over 6 years, first as a reporter and now as an editor. I have covered politics extensively, and my work has appeared in major newspapers and online news outlets around the world. In addition to my writing, I also contribute regularly to 24 Hours World.
