In the next government

FDP leader wants to become finance minister again

(Bild: APA/AFP/Odd Andersen)

FDP leader Christian Lindner, who has been dismissed from the German government, wants to become finance minister once again. "That is my goal, because I am now running for the next German Bundestag," said the 45-year-old on the ZDF program "Was nun, Herr Lindner".

"And the goal is not opposition, but of course I want to continue my work in the next government," Lindner explained on television on Thursday evening. Despite poor polls, the FDP had taken the risk of new elections for its conviction. "And I think you have to do that for once, because that is also a sign of character," said the FDP leader.

"We are now in a state of limbo"
He had proposed an orderly, quick and dignified new election at the coalition committee meeting. Then there would still have been a government capable of acting that could have passed the necessary laws. "Instead, we now have a state of limbo in which there is no legislation and in which there is no acting government, there is only an incumbent one."

Lindner said the following about Transport Minister Volker Wissing, who is leaving the FDP in order to remain a federal minister: "I don't want to say anything more about it than to wish him all the best personally and personally."