Following the collapse of his three-party “traffic light” coalition when he sacked the FDP Finance Minister over a budget dispute in November, he has filed a petition with the lower house to request a confidence vote, only the sixth time since the Second World War that the mechanism has been invoked.
However, his Social Democrats (SPD) lag in third place in the polls behind the conservative Christian Democrats (CDU) and the far-right populist Alternative for Germany (AfD). The Greens and populist left-wing BSW have also gained in the polls, while the FDP are currently polling at under 5%, the threshold for winning any seats at all.
