Merkel celebrates German poll win
BERLIN: German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Monday celebrated an encouraging win for her conservatives in a state election, declaring that her party has “every chance” in upcoming votes.
She said: “We should work toward convincing people.
“I’m simply happy about the result, and that’s what counts. I don’t permanently occupy myself with effects.
“It will be a difficult election campaign and we have every chance.”
With just six months to go until a general election in Europe’s top economy in which Merkel is seeking a fourth term, the poll in the tiny southwestern state of Saarland Sunday took on outsized importance. Voters returned Merkel’s conservative Christian Democrats (CDU) to power with 41 percent of the vote, five points higher than at the last election in 2012.
The center-left Social Democrats (SPD), who had been enjoying a surge in the polls thanks to their freshly-anointed champion, Martin Schulz, came in a distant second with 30 percent. Merkel’s CDU had suffered a string of state poll setbacks in the wake of her decision in 2015 to open the borders to hundreds of thousands of refugees, mainly from strife-ravaged Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan.
Schulz, the former president of the European Parliament, admitted Monday that the result had been a bitter disappointment just a week after SPD delegates unani- mously elected him party chairman. But he tried to put a brave face on the defeat.
“Election campaigns are marathons and not sprints, and we have good stamina,” he said, warning the CDU that “those who are celebrating today shouldn’t count their chickens before they hatch.”
Saarland is governed by a “grand coalition” government, the same right-left alliance that Merkel leads in Berlin. For Schulz to take her job from her, he would likely need to win a majority for a leftist coalition with far-left Die Linke and the ecologist Greens party known as RedRed-Green.
Commentators said the Saarland result indicated voters may be getting cold feet about that prospect. Germany’s top-selling daily Bild said Merkel clearly had the wind in her sails after the Saarland vote, noting the dilemma faced by Schulz and the SPD.
“It’s a small state, but a big signal,” it said of Saarland, the first of three German state polls scheduled in the run-up to the national election on Sept. 24.
“If Martin Schulz wants to become chancellor, he is going to have to put all his eggs in the RedRed-Green basket — a big risk. And Angela Merkel can breathe a sigh of relief and get ready for the next Schulz attack.”
The center-left Sueddeutsche newspaper said the poll had been a crushing reality check for the SPD.