Merkel’s party scores strong win in state poll test

KIEL, Germany: Chancellor Angela Merkel’s conservatives secured a strong win in state polls in northern Germany, partial results showed, giving a boost to her bid to retain power in national elections in September.

Voters in the small, northern state of Schleswig- Holstein handed her CDU party 32.3 per cent, leaving the centre- left Social Democratic Party ( SPD) trailing with 26.9 per cent, partial results showed.

The vote outcome marked a blow for the Social Democrats who had earlier this year seen a surge in support since new leader Martin Schulz was chosen in February. But this enthusiasm appeared to be fading, and Schulz’s supporters are increasingly fearful that the momentum he had been surfing on will not carry him into the chancellery, which Merkel and her Christian Democratic Union (CDU) have held since 2005.

The blow to the Social Democrats’ confidence also came one week ahead of a far bigger regional vote in their stronghold of North Rhine-Westphalia, also Germany’s most populous state.

Schulz expressed disappointment, saying: “This is something that goes under the skin and makes us sad. We all expected a better result.”

Merkel’s CDU meanwhile was confidently looking to next Sunday’s polls, where surveys show the conservatives and the SPD running neck and neck.

“A good election result gives us motivation to go on fighting,” said lawmaker Michael GrosseBroemer, who heads the CDU parliamentary group in the Bundestag.

Merkel’s party has seen a comeback, after losing a string of state elections over the past two years as voters punished the German leader for her liberal refugee policy that allowed more than one million asylum seekers into Germany since 2015. But with the pace of new arrivals slowing sharply, surveys show the conservatives gaining ground. — AFP