Merkel in trouble after losses in key state
Greens and far Right make gains in regional vote that is widely seen as verdict on chancellor’s government
ANGELA MERKEL’S political future looked uncertain yesterday as her coalition government looked to have suffered heavy losses in key regional elections for the second time in as many weeks.
According to initial exit polls, her Christian Democrat party (CDU) recorded its worst result since 1966 in the central state of Hesse. Home to the German financial capital Frankfurt, it is a symbolic prize, having been a CDU stronghold for decades.
But in a vote widely seen as a verdict on Mrs Merkel’s troubled national government, her main coalition partners, the centre-left Social Democrats (SPD), were facing major losses too.
The main beneficiary was the Green Party, which was tied with the SPD for second place and on course to double its vote to emerge as potential kingmaker in the state.
The nationalist Right to far-right Alternative for Germany party (AFD), which had built its appeal to voters based on opposition to Mrs Merkel’s welcoming policy to migrants, also had a successful night and was poised to enter the Hesse parliament, giving it representation in every state parliament in Germany for the first time.
Günter Rudolph, a senior figure in the regional SPD leadership in Hesse, bemoaned: “There was a hurricane from Berlin that bore down on us.”
Although a regional election, most voters used it as an opportunity to send a signal to Mrs Merkel’s national government. Initial projections suggested the CDU would come first in Hesse but with 27.8 per cent of the vote – a fall of more than 10 points compared with elections there in 2013. The SPD were tied with the Greens for second place, on 19 per cent each, with the AFD fourth, on 12.1 per cent.
There was a deathly silence at the chancellor’s CDU party headquarters in Berlin as the results came in.
“This is certainly also a verdict on the national government, which is doing a good job but whose successes are going unnoticed behind the infighting,” said Annegret Kramp-karrenbauer, the CDU party chairman widely seen as Mrs Merkel’s eventual successor. “We need a new working culture in the coalition. This is a signal to all the governing parties that the government has to live up to its responsibilities.” Mrs Merkel’s coalition has been caught up in damaging internal conflicts for much of the year. Although the final seat tally was unclear, Mrs Merkel appeared to have avoided the nightmare scenario of the CDU losing control of the state, as initial projections suggested no coalition would be possible without it. In the run-up to the vote, there had been warnings that she could face a leadership challenge at the party conference in Dec if she lost Hesse.
“We had two election goals. We wanted to become the strongest political group and we wanted to ensure no government could be formed against the Union. As of today, we have succeeded in both,” Volker Bouffier, the CDU’S regional leader said.
But his words echoed Mrs Merkel’s own comments after last year’s national election, and the latest losses will still add to growing concern within her party over whether she can carry on.
There were renewed calls within the SPD for the party to pull out of the national coalition after it suffered its own losses. “This has been a heavy and a bitter evening for the Hessian SPD,” Thorsten Schäfer-gümbel, the party’s regional leader, said. “It’s not just that we didn’t get a tailwind from Berlin: we had regular gales blowing in our faces.”
Andrea Nahles, the SPD leader, last night found herself fighting for her own political future after presiding over historic losses in the elections. “Something has to change in the SPD. We must make it clear what we stand for,” she said. But she also sought to divert the blame on to infighting between the CDU and its Bavarian sister party, the Christian Social Union (CSU).
“The state of the government is not acceptable,” she said. “We expect the CDU to quickly sort out its policy and personal conflicts.”
The big winner was the Green Party, which has emerged as a major force in German politics. “We can be proud of what we have achieved in recent years,” Tarek al-wazir, the Greens’ regional leader, said. “It appears we have gained so much trust from the Hessians that they have given us their votes.”
The Greens’ success largely eclipsed the AFD, which had hoped to dominate coverage of the elections in Hesse and Bavaria. But the nationalists achieved their goal of gaining seats in every regional parliament in Germany.
Regional coalition talks were expected to get under way as soon as the final votes were tallied.
It was unclear yesterday evening whether the current coalition between the CDU and the Greens would have sufficient votes to continue.