Berlin, Oct. 8, (dpa/GNA) – Voters in the German states of Bavaria and Hesse are heading to the polls to elect new state parliaments, in key votes that may prove embarrassing for Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s coalition government.
In the Bavarian capital Munich, voter turnout stood at almost 44% as of 10:30 am (0830 GMT) on Sunday. Polling stations are set to close at 6 pm, with initial projections expected soon afterwards.
Hesse, home of the financial centre Frankfurt, and Bavaria, the country’s biggest state and home of blue-chip firms like Siemens and BMW, are among Germany’s wealthiest states. Together, they also account for about a quarter of Germany’s total population.
Recent polls put the current centre-right incumbents from the CDU/CSU bloc well in the lead in both states, while observers suspect the miserable approval ratings for Scholz’s coalition government have dampened the chances for the Social Democrats or Greens.
Berlin will be watching the elections particularly closely to see whether the centre-right CDU/CSU can profit, or if gains might go to the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD), which been steadily rising in national polls.
In Hesse, German Interior Minister Nancy Faeser is personally campaigning for the Social Democrats, in hopes of ousting current Hessian state premier Boris Rhein of the CDU. But it remains unclear if Faeser’s prominent national profile will help her, given the current unpopularity of the government in Berlin.
Rhein’s CDU is currently in a coalition with the Greens, and has been open to continuing the alliance or ruling together with the Social Democrats.
In Bavaria, state premier Markus Söder looks likely to secure another term with the help of the Free Voters, a regional conservative-libertarian party. Söder’s CSU, the CDU’s Bavarian sister party, has ruled Bavaria without interruption for the past 65 years.
The campaign has been dominated by newspaper reports revealing that Hubert Aiwanger, the leader of the Free Voters and Söder’s deputy, was caught as a teenaged schoolboy in the late 1980s with hateful far-right leaflets mocking the Holocaust and making light about Nazi concentration camps.
Aiwanger eventually acknowledged the incident and apologized but claimed he was the victim of a smear campaign. Söder criticized Aiwanger’s handling of the incident but has kept him on.
The results of Sunday’s vote could offer a preview of state elections next year in the eastern German states of Thuringia, Saxony and Brandenburg, where the far-right AfD currently lead the polls. The results will also send a message to Berlin ahead of national parliamentary elections in 2025.
The state elections in Bavaria and Hesse come about halfway through Scholz’s term in office. His government has been marked by internal squabbles amid struggles with a stagnant economy, high inflation, costly climate change initiatives and renewed controversy over immigration.
GNA