Germany’s Unpopular Chancellor Dodges Political Bullet In State Vote (Worthy News Analysis)
By Stefan J. Bos, Chief International Correspondent Worthy News
BERLIN/BUDAPEST (Worthy News) – Unpopular Chancellor Olaf Scholz was offered a rare political lifeline as his Social Democrats (SPD) narrowly defeated the fiercely anti-migration Alternative for Germany (AfD) party in Sunday’s elections in the eastern state of Brandenburg.
The final results, released by the German state’s electoral administration, showed that the Social Democrats received 30.9 percent of the vote, while the AfD trailed closely at 29 percent.
Yet the AfD’s share of the vote worried SPD voters, who view it as a “dangerous far-right party” and the first such grouping to win a previous state election in Germany since World War Two.
Yet the AfD could not repeat its September 1 election success in the eastern state of Thuringia. On Sunday, about two million voters in Brandenburg decided to stick with the SPD, an important political force in Germany for decades.
The outcome gave some hope for Scholz, who has faced the lowest approval rating of a German chancellor in the history of the research group Infratest Dimap poll, which has been tracking monthly sentiment since 1997.
His approval rating stood at just 18 percent, according to a survey published by Infratest Dimap this month.
PRESSURE MOUNTING
Analysts said pressures os mount on Scholz as state elections mirror concerns nationwide about issues such as mass immigration from mainly Muslim-majority nations after several Islamic attacks in recent weeks.
German police said that a man who opened fire near the Israeli consulate and a Nazi-era documentation center in Munich this month before being shot dead by police was planning a “terrorist attack.”
Separately, the Islamic State group claimed responsibility for last month’s attack in the western German city of Solingen, where authorities said a Syrian man armed with a knife killed three people and injured eight others.
The public prosecutor accused the suspect of being motivated by “radical Islamist convictions.”
Besides concerns about mass immigration fueled by extremism, voters also expressed concerns about ongoing arms deliveries to Ukraine – and related security concerns.
They also fear these policies will add to ongoing economic problems in Germany: The European Union’s largest economy faces an exodus of major industries, a rapidly worsening demographic picture, crumbling infrastructure, and a lack of innovation.
COMMUNICATIVE ISSUES
It doesn’t help that Scholz, 66, isn’t known for his communicative skills and that his three-party coalition has been compared to a kindergarten due to ongoing infighting.
His SPD, the environmentalist, traditionally left-leaning Greens, and the pro-business Free Democrats take different approaches to the economy and other issues.
Such was the apparent concerns over the negative impact of association with Scholz and his SPD-led government that the Brandenburg SPD avoided campaign appearances with the chancellor. This was remarkable, as he lives a stone’s throw away from Brandenburg’s regional state parliament in Potsdam.
Yet Sunday’s election outcome made him dodge a political bullet for now.
However, the AfD said it is now a force to be reckoned with, and it remained unclear whether the narrow victory would improve Scholtz’s re-election chances.
For now, Scholz appears somewhat happy with the Brandsnburg results. “It’s great that we won,” Scholz said from New York, attending a United Nations gathering.
Yet commentators were quick to point out that the SPD’s success in Brandenburg was mainly due to the efforts of state governor Dietmar Woidke, who distanced himself from Scholz during the campaign.
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