German expert: “Success for CDU”

If the numbers from the polling station poll conducted by Public Service Channel MDR are correct, that represents an increase of more than six percentage points over the last state election in 2016 for the CDU. Many polling stations show similar results.

Alternative Xenophobia for Germany (AFD) – which locally in Saxony Anhalt is considered more radical than the party’s national level – again appears to be the second-largest party with 22.5 percent of the vote, down less than two percentage points compared to the 2016 election result.

He seemed to lie evenly

Initial numbers point to a surprisingly high success for the CDU — with a firearm that upfront turnout appeared to be low, says Rutger Lindahl, professor emeritus of political science at the University of Gothenburg.

Many may have hoped for it, but they still couldn’t guess it, he says, referring to the fact that the CDU looks on par with the AFD in the polls.

The CDU has ruled Saxony-Anhalt in alliance with the Social Democrats (SPD) and the Green Party for the past five years. According to a polling station survey, the Social Democrats have lost two percentage points since 2016, to 8.5 percent, while the Greens have increased just over one percentage point to 6.5 percent.

New coalition

According to preliminary figures, the liberal FDP will receive just over 6 percent. Thus, the party appears to have crossed the five percent barrier, missing it by just 0.1 percent in 2016.

Lindahl says it opens the door to a new alliance between the CDU, the SPD and the liberal FDP at the local and national levels as well.

The Christian Democrats could signal at the state level that they may not be too keen on including the Greens in a future federal government and that they include the Liberals instead. If the SPD and the Liberals agreed to it in Saxony-Anhalt, there is a reasonable idea that they could agree to it at the federal level as well.

You can’t exhale

Although the state is small in size, the outcome of the elections in Saxony-Anhalt, located in the former East German part of the country, could have wider consequences. This is because it is the last state election before the parliamentary elections in the fall, and thus gives an idea of ​​the standing of the CDU under the leadership of the relatively newly elected party leader Armin Laschet.

His predecessor as party leader, Angela Merkel, has been chancellor since 2005. She will resign after the September elections.

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– no he can not. But it was in any case a positive result for the CDU. I think it is a personal success for the current Prime Minister, Rainer Haselov. Lindahl says he has been able, more than Lachet, to garner voter support.

It is noteworthy that the left-wing D-Link party seems to lose more than five percentage points compared to 2016 compared to 11 percent.