Daily Times

German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s coalition government looked more fragile than ever Monday after two of its three parties suffered severe election setbacks in the state of Bavaria.

The poll debacle for the conservative CSU and the centre-left SPD cast a dark cloud over Merkel’s troubled grand coalition, dubbed the “GroKo”, which has been plagued by infighting, mostly about immigration.

“The Bavaria election has made an early end to the GroKo much more likely,” said Der Spiegel about the alliance Merkel’s Christian Democrats (CDU) forged in March after half a year of painful negotiations.

“Two of three partners in the GroKo have suffered brutal losses. The third, Angela Merkel’s CDU, fears the consequences.”

In Sunday’s election, the Christian Social Union (CSU) from Merkel’s conservative camp took a 10-point dive to 37 percent to lose its absolute majority in the Alpine state it has ruled since the 1960s.

Merkel’s other national coalition partner, the centre-left Social Democrats (SPD), dropped to 9.7 percent, halving their support in their worst-ever result in any state poll.

The biggest winners were the Greens, who surged to become Bavaria’s second strongest party with 17.5 percent, drawing support especially in big cities like Munich.

The far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD), which has railed against Merkel’s 2015 decision to keep open German borders to a mass influx of refugees and migrants, scored 10 percent.

Their success was cheered by far-right European leaders, including Marine Le Pen of France and Italy’s Matteo Salvini, who said that “in Bavaria, change has won” and sent an “arrivederci” (goodbye) to Merkel.

The AfD’s Alice Weidel jubilantly declared that Merkel’s government “is not a grand coalition but a mini coalition” and demanded she “clear the way for new elections”.

Shattered certainties

The Bavaria poll result shattered old certainties for the CSU, which has ruled almost single-handedly for decades in the southern state known for its fairytale castles, Oktoberfest and crucifixes on classroom walls.

Since the mass migrant influx, in which Bavaria was Germany’s frontline state, the CSU has hardened its usual folksy beerhall politics with tougher anti-immigration and law and order positions.

Nonetheless, they and other mainstream parties took heavy losses in 2017 general elections to the AfD, which became the first rightwing extremist party to enter the German national parliament in significant numbers.

The CSU’s Interior Minister Horst Seehofer has harshly criticised Merkel and the SPD over their more liberal stance on immigration, repeatedly bringing their alliance to the brink of collapse.

The political battles this summer, one centred on securing German borders against asylum seekers, have distracted Merkel’s fourth-term government and angered voters.

After Sunday’s election, Seehofer, 69, insisted he would stay on as Merkel’s interior minister, even as a poll for news weekly Focus said 46 percent of Germans blame him and his brinkmanship for the CSU’s historically-poor result.

Merkel’s ‘litmus test’

The Sueddeutsche daily said that, following what it labelled a new milestone in the decline of German mainstream parties, Merkel’s coalition now has a stark choice: a return to “common sense, or new elections”.

The SPD’s deputy leader Ralf Stegner told Phoenix TV that “the citizens delivered a resounding slap” to the governing parties and that, unless they change, “the grand coalition won’t last much longer”.

In Berlin, the GroKo leaders, still stunned by what was widely dubbed Bavaria’s electoral “earthquake”, are now nervously looking ahead to another landmark regional vote at the end of the month.

Voters go to the polls on October 28 in central Hesse state, home to the financial hub Frankfurt, where polls say Merkel ally Volker Bouffier will face an uphill battle to stay on as state premier.

Die Welt daily said the Hesse vote will be “the litmus test” for Merkel, who is running for re-election as CDU party chief at a congress in December.

“Merkel’s future could be decided in Hesse,” the newspaper said, “because a loss there would imperil her re-election at the party congress.”

Published in Daily Times, October 16^th 2018.