Scholz’s SDP party faces election test in key state of North Rhine- Westphalia

An election in Germany’s most populous state on Sunday poses an early test for Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s Social Democrats five months after he took office with a domestic policy focus that was quickly eclipsed by the Ukraine crisis.

“North Rhine- Westphalia always sends an important signal for federal politics,” Nico Siegel, executive director of pollster Infratest dimap, said in a statement.

The center- left Social Democrats ( SPD) dominated North Rhine- Westphalia ( NRW) – home to more than a fifth of Germany’s population and to the rustbelt Ruhr region – for most of the past half century.

But the party lost to former chancellor Angela Merkel’s conservatives ( CDU) in its worst state election in 2017, under attack for its failure to tackle traffic jams and a rising crime rate. A few months later, it also suffered a record defeat at the federal level.

Ahead of Sunday’s vote, the two parties were very close in the polls, with the CDU having a slight lead at 32 percent versus 28 percent for the SPD in a survey published by INSA on Thursday.

“An election victory would radiate, in a positive sense, into discussions about the SPD’s strength in the federal government and Olaf Scholz’s popularity,” Siegel said.

The NRW election is also seen giving a boost to Germany’s environmentalist Greens party, which could become kingmaker.

The CDU has governed the state in a coalition with business- friendly FDP since 2017. But even with its slight lead over the SPD, it might not be able to secure a majority with just the FDP, which stood at 8 percent in the polls.

The Greens most recently polled around 16 percent, which means either party is likely to need the Greens to form a state government.

Last week, the CDU won by a landslide in the considerably smaller northern state of Schleswig- Holstein, but in NRW it will have a much harder time securing votes.

Local issues such as affordable rents and public transport are usually what determines voters’ decisions in state elections.