Merkel wins 4th term: Exit polls
Hard-right anti-immigrant party AfD makes historic House debut
Chancellor Angela Merkel clinched a fourth term in Germany’s general election on Sunday, but her victory was clouded by the hard-right AfD party winning its first seats in Parliament.
Ms Merkel, who after 12 years in power held a double-digit lead for most of the campaign, scored around 33 per cent of the vote with her conservative Christian Union (CDU/CSU) bloc, according to exit polls.
Its nearest rivals, the Social Democrats and their candidate Martin Schulz, came in a distant second, with about 20-21 per cent.
But, in a bombshell for the German establishment, the anti-Islam, antiimmigration Alternative for Germany (AfD) captured around 13 per cent, making it the country’s third biggest political force.
The four-year-old party with links to the far-right French National Front and Britain’s UKIP has been shunned by Germany’s mainstream.
It is now headed for the Opposition benches of the Bundestag, dramatically boosting its visibility.
Berlin, Sept. 24: Chancellor Angela Merkel won a fourth term in German elections on Sunday, but her victory was clouded by the historic entry of an openly anti-immigration hard-right party into parliament, exit polls showed. Ms Merkel’s conservative bloc garnered between 32.5 and 33.5 per cent, well ahead of the second placed Social Democratic Party with 20-21 per cent, national broadcasters ARD and ZDF said in separate exit polls.
The hard-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) clinched third spot, obtaining between 13 and 13.5 per cent of the vote, they added.
Meanwhile, the Social Democrats said they would go into opposition rather than enter a new coalition with Merkel’s party after they suffered their worst post-war results in Sunday’s election.
Europe’s most powerful woman appears all but assured of winning another term, in theory matching the 16-year reign of her mentor Helmut Kohl.
Surveys suggest her conservative CDU/CSU alliance has a double-digit lead over its nearest rivals, the centre-left Social Democratic Party (SPD) of Martin Schulz.
With four other parties predicted to clear the fivepercent threshold to enter the Bundestag, the highest number since the 1950s, it could take months of coalition wrangling before the next government takes shape.
But mainstream parties have already ruled out talking to the anti-Islam, anti-immigration Alternative for Germany (AfD), which is polling at 11 to 13 percent and could emerge as Germany’s thirdstrongest party.
Alarmed by the prospect of what foreign minister Sigmar Gabriel branded “real Nazis” entering the Bundestag for the first since World War II, politicians used their final days of campaigning to urge voters to reject the AfD.
“This Alternative for Germany is no alternative. They are a shame for our nation,” former European Parliament chief Schulz told a rally on Friday.
The latest surveys put support for Merkel’s conservative block at 34-36 percent, with the SPD trailing at 21-22 percent — which would translate into a historic low for the party. Despite bracing for a drubbing, Mr Schulz was all smiles as he and his wife cast their ballot in his western hometown of Wuerselen. Ms Merkel and her husband voted at a polling station near their flat in central Berlin.
Ms Merkel, 63, whose campaign events were regularly disrupted by jeering AfD supporters, said at her final stump speech in the southern city of Munich that “the future of Germany will definitely not be built with whistles and hollers”.
Observers say a strong showing by the AfD, would hit Germany like a bombshell.