German federal election, 1994

German federal election, 1994

← 1990 16 October 1994 (1994-10-16) 1998 →
All 672 seats in the Bundestag 337 seats were needed for a majority
Turnout	79.0% (voting eligible)
First party Second party Third party   Leader Helmut Kohl Rudolf Scharping Antje Vollmer Party CDU/CSU SPD Green Leader since 1973 1993 Last election 319 seats 239 seats 8 seats Seats won 294 252 49 Seat change 25 13 41 Popular vote 19,517,156 17,140,354 3,424,315 Percentage 41.4% 36.4% 7.3% Swing 2.4% 2.9% 2.3%   Fourth party Fifth party   Leader Klaus Kinkel Gregor Gysi Party FDP PDS Leader since 1993 1990 Last election 79 seats 17 seats Seats won 47 30 Seat change 32 13 Popular vote 3,258,407 2,066,176 Percentage 6.9% 4.4% Swing 4.1% 2.0%
Party list election results by state: dark blue denotes states where CSU had the absolute majority of the votes; lighter blue denotes states where CDU had the plurality of votes; and pink denotes states where the SPD had the plurality of votes
Chancellor before election Helmut Kohl CDU/CSU Elected Chancellor Helmut Kohl CDU/CSU

Helmut Kohl
CDU/CSU

Helmut Kohl
CDU/CSU

German federal elections took place on 16 October 1994, to elect members to the 13th Bundestag (parliament) of the Federal Republic of Germany.

The SPD let its members elect a candidate for Chancellor against Helmut Kohl. Rudolf Scharping, Minister-President of Rhineland-Palatinate, beat Gerhard Schröder and Heidemarie Wieczorek-Zeul in the SPD's internal election. Tension between Scharping and other SPD leaders such as Oskar Lafontaine and Gerhard Schröder hampered his campaign.

For the first time the Green party seemed to be willing to actually join a government in the event that a SPD – Green coalition had the majority.

The coalition between the CDU/CSU and the FDP was able to continue in power with Helmut Kohl as chancellor.

The PDS won four constituency seats in its power base of the former East Berlin, qualifying it for proportional representation seats even though the party failed to cross the 5% electoral threshold. Under a longstanding electoral law intended to benefit regional parties, any party that won at least three constituency seats was entitled to its share of proportionally-elected seats regardless of vote share.