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German chancellor Olaf Scholz has urged mainstream parties to exclude “rightwing extremists”, after preliminary results showed the far-right Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) had come top in a state election.
Voters in two closely watched elections in the former communist east made clear their dissatisfaction with Germany’s mainstream political parties, putting the AfD in the top spot in Thuringia, with 32.8 per cent of the vote, and second place in Saxony, with 30.6 per cent, according to preliminary results.
Mr Scholz called the results “bitter” and “worrying”.
“Our country cannot and must not get used to this. The AfD is damaging Germany. It is weakening the economy, dividing society and ruining our country’s reputation,” Mr Scholz said, adding the most dire predictions, that his centre-left Social Democrats (SPD) might fall out of a state parliament for the first time, had not materialised.
Reacting to the German state election results, Valérie Hayer, a French politician who serves as president of the liberal Renew Europe, said “a dark day for Germany is a dark day for Europe”.
“The election result in Thuringia and Saxony is unprecedented. We shall not let Europe give in to racist, anti-Semitic, misogynist and homophobic movements,” she said.
Similarly to countries like the United States, Germany’s 16 states have considerable powers. While the federal government is responsible for foreign affairs and defence, states play a role in policymaking in areas ranging from education to policing and healthcare. The states have their own parliaments and coalition governments.
The success has left Germany’s main opposition party facing political contortions to find a way to govern a pair of eastern regions without involving the far-right party.
AfD became the first far-right party to win a state election in postwar Germany in Thuringia on Sunday under one of its hardest-right figures, Björn Höcke.
In neighbouring Saxony, it finished only just behind the mainstream conservative Christian Democratic Union (CDU), which leads the national opposition.
Deep discontent with a national government notorious for infighting, inflation and a weak economy, anti-immigration sentiment and scepticism toward German military aid for Ukraine are among the factors that contributed to support for populist parties in the formerly communist east, which is less prosperous than western Germany.
A new party founded by a prominent leftist was the second big winner on Sunday – and will probably be needed to form state governments since no one is prepared to govern with AfD.
The debacle for the governing parties added to awful performances in the European Parliament election in June for Mr Scholz’s coalition, and it is not obvious that they have any recipe for turning things around with Germany’s next national election due in just over a year.
Another state election on September 22nd in an eastern region – Brandenburg, which unlike the two that voted Sunday is currently led by Mr Scholz’s centre-left Social Democrats – could add to their embarrassment.
AfD holds now more than a third of the seats, at least in Thuringia’s state legislature – which would, for example, allow it to block appointments of judges to the regional constitutional court – and that will make it hard to build workable governments.
The party’s strength in the east has pushed other parties into unconventional coalitions as far back as 2016, but Sunday’s results took that to a new level.
In Thuringia, even a previously improbable combination of the CDU, Mr Scholz’s party and the new leftist Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance lacks a majority.
To get one, the conservatives would also need help from the Left Party, which is descended from East Germany’s communist rulers and led the outgoing state government. So far, they have refused to work with it. – Agencies