Olaf Scholz of the Social Democrats has been voted in as Germany’s new chancellor.
Scholz got the support of 395 politicians in the Bundestag on Wednesday morning and will replace Angela Merkel, who is standing down after 16 years.
He was voted in by the German parliament, where his three-party coalition has a substantial majority, and was given a standing ovation.
The vote was not a surprise. Scholz’s SPD and its coalition partners, the Free Democrats and the Greens, have 416 seats in the 736 lower house of the German parliament.
The election puts a Social Democrat at the head of a German government for the first time in 16 years, after Merkel succeeded Gerhard Schroeder as chancellor in 2005. Schroeder was in the Bundestag to watch as Scholz was voted in.
Scholz, 63, has a long political career behind him, as mayor of the city-state of Hamburg and finance minister and vice-chancellor in Merkel’s Cabinet during the past four years.
After the vote in parliament, he was asked by Bundestag President Bärbel Bas whether he accepted the appointment. He posted his response – “I said ‘yes'” – on his Twitter feed.
The election brought Merkel’s 16-year-rule to an end. Farewells were already coming in on Wednesday, including one from French President Emmanuel Macron.
The September elections gave the SPD a narrow majority in relation to Merkel’s conservative bloc, made up of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) and its Bavarian sister party, the Christian Social Union (CSU).
The full Cabinet was to be sworn in later on Wednesday. The outgoing ministers were to hand over formally to the new, with Scholz surrendering the finance portfolio to Christian Lindner, the FDP leader.
(With inputs from agencies)
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