(22 Sep 2013) The leader of the centre-right Social Democratic Party cast his vote in Germany's parliamentary election on Sunday, saying he "felt good" and well rested as he challenges Chancellor Angela Merkel in her fight for a third term in office.
Polls show her centre-right coalition on a knife-edge as her junior partner's support slumps.
Merkel and her conservative Christian Democratic Union (CDU) appear likely to fend off a challenge from rival Peer Steinbrueck and emerge as the biggest party in the lower house of Parliament, whose members choose the chancellor.
"The campaign was great fun, the SPD managed to mobilise itself in the last 4 weeks, which was great and helped. You will understand that I hope that it will show in the result," said Steinbrueck after casting his vote in Bonn on Sunday.
Voters across the country started casting their ballots. Nearly 62 million eligible voters can cast two ballots in Sunday's parliamentary election, one for a directly elected representative and the other for a party.
No single party has won an absolute majority in Germany in more than 50 years.
Surveys show Merkel's junior coalition partner, the pro-business Free Democratic Party, has fallen from the nearly 15 percent support it won in the 2009 election to about the 5 percent level needed to keep any seats in Parliament.
If Merkel's alliance falls short of a parliamentary majority, the likeliest outcome is a switch to a Merkel-led "grand coalition" of her conservatives with Steinbrueck's Social Democratic Party, the same combination of traditional rivals that ran Germany from 2005 to 2009 in Merkel's first term.
In the Bavarian town of Schliersee, voters turned up clad in traditional dress before attending Oktoberfest beer festivities.
The mayor of the town, Franz Schnitzenbaumer, said that topping the issues agenda for him and his constituents was energy policy and the eurozone debt crisis.
Bavaria is a traditional stronghold of the conservative Christian Social Union (CSU), which won an absolute majority in last week's state parliament elections.
The CSU is the Bavarian sister party of Merkel's CDU.
Some voters casting their ballots in capital Berlin on Sunday bet on the results yielding to a "grand coalition."
Final results are due within hours of the polls closing.

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