Future of German chancellor hangs in the balance as two states go to polls

Embattled Friedrich Merz faces nervous wait while far-right Alternative für Deutschland party targets further gains

Voters in two German states are going to the polls with the political future of the embattled chancellor, Friedrich Merz , hanging in the balance and an emboldened far right targeting further gains.

Coming two weeks after a seismic election in Saxony-Anhalt in which the anti-immigration, pro-Kremlin Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) scored its highest ever result in a regional poll, the nativist party is expected to drain support again from Merz’s conservative Christian Democratic Union (CDU).

Just how brutal the outcome is could affect Merz’s ability to hang on as leader after only 16 months in power, possibly setting wheels in motion for his replacement or even snap elections – currently regarded as unlikely but not ruled out.

About 2.5 million people are eligible to vote in the capital Berlin and nearly 1.3 million in the Baltic coast state of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania. Polling booths open at 8am local time on Sunday and will close at 6pm, when Merz and his allies will be watching exit polls on tenterhooks.

The luckless chancellor has resisted calls to quit and vowed to fight for a signature package of economic and social welfare changes he argues are crucial to Germany’s future.

“We as a government were elected for four years, I was elected for four years,” he told an industry group. “And I want to use these four years to lead the country out of this difficult period.”

Merz, whose personal approval ratings have nosedived to 10%, cancelled a plan to speak at the UN general assembly in New York because “his presence is required in Berlin” after the elections, a government official said.

His credibility has been tarnished by broken campaign promises to return Europe’s largest economy to growth and cut the AfD, the biggest opposition party in parliament and number one in opinion polls, down to size.

The AfD fell just short of an absolute majority in former communist Saxony-Anhalt, which would have allowed it to govern on its own. It is looking for defectors from other parties to make it the first far-right force to run a German state since the Nazi period.

However, polls indicate the AfD will fall well short of such a prospect in both of Sunday’s elections, even with its palpable sense of momentum.

In Berlin, which is one of Germany’s 16 federal states, the incumbent CDU is vying for first place against the far-left Die Linke, which has called for expropriation of corporate landlords to fight rising housing costs.

About 85% of Berlin households rent their ​homes and advertised rents have nearly doubled since 2014, when the city was still labelled “poor but sexy” by its then mayor, Klaus Wowereit.

The AfD is polling strongly in third or fourth place, even in the cosmopolitan capital.