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Again? Third of Germans want fresh elections

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Again? Third of Germans want fresh elections
Photo: DPA

Germans are growing so tired of politicians dithering over forming a coalition government that a third would rather vote again in fresh elections, an opinion poll suggested on Thursday.

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One in three Germans want a second election, a survey released on Thursday showed - just hours before talks were set to start between Merkel's Christian Democratic Union (CDU/CSU) and the Green Party to explore a potential coalition partnership.

Merkel's CDU/CSU, despite securing its most convincing win since German reunification, was caught out by the dramatic events of election night. Not only did her party just fall short of an absolute majority needed to rule alone, but the chancellor’s previous coalition partners, the Free Democrats (FDP) were booted out of parliament.

Three weeks on, Merkel has yet to secure a coalition partner to form a government despite having approached both the main opposition Social Democrats (SPD) and the Green Party.

Many voters are now frustrated with the political stalemate and as many as 33 percent even believe the best way forward would be to scrap the results and hold a fresh vote, a TNS Infratest study published by the Huffington Post Deutschland showed. The majority - 62 percent - said they would not like to see a second vote and five percent were unsure.

In the 30-44 age bracket, 40 percent would support fresh elections as opposed to just 26 percent of over 60s.

Meanwhile, there was a marked difference in the views of various party supporters. Fifty-seven percent of supporters of the Left Party, which overtook the Greens to become Germany's third largest party on September 22, would like a re-vote.

Supporters of centre parties - the SPD and CDU - were more sceptical, with just 27 and 26 percent wanting to vote again. Surprisingly given a poor showing last time round, Green party supporters were also not enthusiastic about a re-vote - 83 percent would rather stick with the initial results.

READ MORE: Merkel and left-wing rival end first round of talks

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