The electoral calendar in Berlin is clarifying and speeding up. Six days after social-democrat Chancellor Olaf Scholz's coalition imploded – sparked by his decision to sack his finance minister, liberal party leader Christian Lindner (FDP) – Scholz's the SPD and the Christian Democratic opposition alliance (CDU/CSU) agreed to hold early elections on Tuesday, November 12. According to the agreed-upon timetable, Scholz should officially request that the "question of confidence" be put to the Bundestag on December 11; MPs will then vote on December 16, which will likely bring down his government, for lack of a majority of support.

The president of the Federal Republic, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, will then dissolve the Bundestag, and snap elections will be called within 60 days. These are set to take place on February 23, 2025. "The date at the end of February has now been set and I am very grateful for that," Scholz said in a speech in parliament on Wednesday. Germany, which is accustomed to holding parliamentary elections just before the Munich Oktoberfest, may therefore, this time, have to vote during its preparations for the Carnival season, which begins on February 27.

The two dates – that of the vote of confidence and that of the elections – are set one month earlier than the schedule that the Chancellor had announced on November 6, and are the result of the negotiations between the Social Democrats and the Christian Democrats. Friedrich Merz, CDU president and likely future chancellor, had spoken in favor of dissolving the Bundestag in mid-November; while Scholz had been hoping to take some time to pass a few laws in the Bundestag by mid-January, even in the absence of a majority. A compromise was, therefore, reached between the two.

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