BERLIN, May 7 (Reuters) – Germany’s Alternative for Germany (AfD) is on track to become the strongest party in an eastern state election in September, a poll showed on Thursday, raising the prospect of the far-right party leading a regional government for the first time.
The infratest dimap survey showed support for the AfD climbing to 41% in the state of Saxony Anhalt, up 2 points from the last poll, and well ahead of Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s conservative CDU at 26%. The Social Democrats, Merz’s junior partners in the federal coalition, trailed at 7%.
Although support for the AfD has long been strongest in former Communist eastern states, disillusionment with the coalition is widespread just one year after Merz took office and the party is roughly level with the CDU in national polls.
Other parties have said they will not cooperate with the AfD, which wants tough migrant policies and closer ties with Russia, but they are struggling to challenge it, especially as an energy shock from the Iran war threatens a fragile recovery in Europe’s biggest economy.
With the Left party at 12% and Greens and populist BSW at 4%, respectively, below the threshold needed to enter the state parliament, the poll points to complicated coalition-building after the September 6 vote if the AfD is to be kept out of government.
(Reporting by Madeline Chambers, Editing by Friederike Heine)
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