On Sunday, the citizens of Luxembourg voted in the general elections and now it is up to the Grand Duke to decide who will form a new government. While prime minister Jean-Claude Juncker's Christian Democrat CSV lost voters and now has 23 seats of the 60 seat parliament, the Liberal DP gained a few seats and now ties with the Socialist LSAP for 13. The Greens took six seats and we can forget about the rest for the sake of this post.
Xavier Bettel and the Hereditary Grand Ducal Couple (Photo: Christian Aschman / Cour grand-ducale) |
You might remember that the previous government under Mr Juncker came down after the spy scandal and the role (or non-role as he was too busy with other things to notice what was going on) Juncker played in it. Prior to the elections, the DP, LSAP and Déi Gréng promoted a possible three-party coalition and it seems as if that might be coming true as the parties already started talks last night. If the new coalition indeed comes true, Luxembourg's mayor Xavier Bettel will become the new prime minister.
It will be up to the Grand Duke to mandate one of the party leaders to form a government. There are two ways of doing that by either by appointing a formateur or an informateur. A formateur is a politician who is chosen by the head of state to form a government. In difference, the informateur is not expected to finalise a coalition but an authorised person who shall explore the possibilities of forming a government so that the Grand Duke does not need to meddle in politics.
In order to decide what to do, Grand Duke Henri has been holding talks with various polticians, namely the party leaders of the CSV, LSAP, DP, Déi Gréng, Déi Lénk and ADR as well as the prime minister, the outgoing president of the Chamber of Deputies and the president of the Council of State, yesterday and today.
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