Germany’s Christian Democrats won a decisive victory in elections in the eastern state of Saxony-Anhalt on Sunday, in a huge boost for their leader Armin Laschet and his bid to succeed Angela Merkel as chancellor in September. The CDU was able to hold off a strong challenge from the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD), which had sought to capitalize on widespread public discontent over the Covid-19 lockdown. It was a sobering night for the Greens, who have been riding high in the polls since naming the popular MP Annalena Baerbock as their first candidate for chancellor in April. They had hoped for a breakthrough but scored only 6.0 percent.
Projections by German public broadcaster ARD, traditionally seen as an accurate predictor of final results, put the Christian Democratic Union on 36.6 percent, up more than 6 points on the state’s last elections in 2016. The AfD trailed at 22.0 percent, down 2.3 percentage points on its 2016 result.
The projections, based on exit polls, suggest that the current coalition of CDU, Social Democrats and Greens, led by the CDU’s Reiner Haseloff, will have enough seats in the regional parliament to continue in power. But the CDU could also choose to form a partnership with the SPD and the pro-business Free Democrats (FDP). “I have been prime minister for ten years, and people know me, they know. . . what I stand for,” Haseloff, a 67-year-old former academic, told ARD. “I think this credibility was a decisive factor.”
He also thanked voters for “building a clear firewall against the far-right” by supporting the centre-right CDU rather than the AfD. Some polls prior to the election had suggested the Aff could beat the CDU into second place. Even if that happened, however, it would not be in a position to form a government as no other party is willing to form a coalition with it. Annalena Baerbock O Mika The AD’s stunning result in 2016, when it won nearly a quarter of the vote, reflected the public backlash against Angela Merkel’s liberal immigration policies and the influx in Screenshot If more than a million asylum-seekers, most of