Fifteen days after the collapse of the coalition Olaf Scholz, Germany has already set the candidates of the main parties for the early elections on February 23. Three of them are identified as from the political center: the social democrat Scholz, the leader of the conservative bloc Friedrich Merz or green Robert Habeck. In front of them, two leaders of parliamentary extremism, the far-right Alice Weidel and the populist left of Sahra Wagenknecht.
The fight of Merz, the next chancellor according to the polls, is not so much aimed at recovering votes from the centrism that represented Angela Merkel. His strategy includes recovering anti-asylum electorate. Scholz’s refusal to hand over his Taurus missiles to Ukraine or your willingness to dialogue with Vladimir Putin points to a desire to attract voters who are opposed to arms supplies to kyiv, whether out of fear of Moscow or a new pacifism.
Scholz, for a very unlikely second term
The chancellor was appointed this Monday by unity of his leadership as a candidate of the Social Democratic Party (SPD). The aim was to give an image of cohesion, somewhat forced. His popular defense minister, Boris Pistoriushad resigned last week from being the one who led the social democracy. The polls pointed to greater support for the vital minister compared to the apathetic chancellor: 60% of citizens saw Pistorius as more suitable than Scholz to seek the reassembled. With his resignation, an internal dilemma that was damaging to the party was resolved. But despite the display of unity, the SPD remains stuck on a voting intention of 15%.
Scholz places himself among the Western allies who exasperate Volodímir Zelenski with his slowness in decision making. Germany is the second contributor after the US to aid to kyiv, with a volume of 7.1 billion euros in 2024 alone. But it took a long time to give the green light to the shipment of its tanks. Leopardto its air defense systems Patriot o IRIS. Now Scholz has castled himself in the refusal to deliver Taurus long-range missiles. Thus he contradicts the opinion of both kyiv or its main Western allies, as well as the conservative opposition and its green partners, its only support in the Government, after breaking with the third partner, the liberals. “We will do everything necessary to prevent the war from escalating into a conflict between NATO and Russia,” he insisted, after his appointment.
His recent conversation with Vladimir Putin was inappropriate in the eyes of France and other allies, because shortly afterwards the Kremlin announced the expansion of the ““Russian” nuclear doctrine. With this, Scholz placed himself within a greater radius of acceptability among the voters of the dying traditional left and the revitalized leftism of Wagenknecht. Between this new left and the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD), identifiable as pro-Russian, they represent almost 50% of the votes in the eastern German regional elections.
Merz, the virtual winner unmarked by centrism
CDU leader Friedrich Merz during a session in the Busdestag. / CLEMENS BILAN / EFE
“It is illusory to imagine that everything is resolved by rejecting immigrants at the border,” former Chancellor Angela Merkel said these days, in an interview with the weekly ‘Der Spiegel’, before the launch of her memoirs ‘Freiheit’ (‘Freedom’). . He criticized the hot expulsion plan which is defended by the current leader of the conservative bloc, Friedrich Merz, a historical rival of the former chancellor. Merkel continues to defend her decision to maintain open borders during the 2015 migration crisis. But that decision gave wings to the then newly founded AfD, now catapulted to second position in voting intention.
The voting intention of the Merz bloc is at 33%, while the AfD is around 19%. The commitment to the expulsions of the leader of the so-called moderate right comes when throughout Europe the extreme right is setting standards in immigration policy. There is a search for the vote that escaped towards the far right. One difference marks, however, the distance between Merz’s conservative bloc and other European right-wing parties: in Germany the cordon sanitaire against the AfD. This was the case with the centrist Merkel in power; This is how it continues to be with the right-wing Merz in full race towards the Chancellery.
Habeck, the new green centrism
The Minister of Economy and leader of the Greens in Germany, Robert Habeck, during the Climate Summit in Baku, on November 18. / LARISSA SCHWEDES / DPA / EUROPA PRESS
The German Greens left behind the pacifism of its origins. With the war of aggression against Ukraine, Vice Chancellor and Minister of Economy, Robert Habeck, has always been two steps ahead of Scholz when it comes to support for kyiv. Already as a candidate for the environmentalist party, he maintains that, if he follows his party in the next government, he will support sending the Taurus to kyiv. Habeck has had an erratic drift with respect to Gazain line with the dominant German panic at any criticism of Israel. But as far as Ukraine is concerned he has had no doubts. The commitment to Israel and the fear that all condemnation Benjamin Netanyahu be branded antisemitism It has separated the Greens from the young vote, their reason for being in their origins. Now that he has matured, or gotten older, he has gained support as a representative of “sensible environmentalism,” as Habeck likes to define himself. The leader of the Greens presents himself as a ‘close’ candidate, who speaks to the voter from the kitchen table of his home or that of other citizens. It tries to break the image of the Greens as a party of ‘academics’ and people with higher education, oblivious to the real problems of the rest of the population.
The voting intention places the party of Habeck and the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Annalena Baerbockin a near tie with Scholz’s SPD. The Conservatives have so far ruled out the Greens as future partners. Merz’s argument is not only ideological: he punishes Habeck with the description of “worst Minister of Economy” in the history of the country. Germany will close 2024 in recession, for the second consecutive year. Habeck argues that it is due to the crisis precipitated by the war in Ukraine. Remember that Germany cultivated for decades energy dependence on Russiawhether under Merkel or the social democrat Gerhard Schröder.
Weidel and Wagenknecht, the two faces of extremism
The leader of Alternative for Germany (AfD), Alice Weidel. / FILIP SINGER / EFE
The only woman among the top positions in the polls is far-right Alice Weidelco-president of the AfD. She has no options for the Chancellery, despite occupying second position in voting intention, since the rest of the political spectrum discards her as a partner. But the rise of their training has already marked the agenda, both in the immigration policy as with respect to Ukraine. He bases his campaign on the denunciation of the firewall as an “anti-democratic mechanism” and stands as the banner of what he describes as authentic pacifism. That is, peace between Moscow and kyiv, from a perspective similar to that of the Kremlin.
The leader of the German populist left Sahra Wagenknecht. / CLEMENS BILAN / EFE
The other woman’s face is that of Sahra Wagenknechtin last position among the formations that will remain above 5%. Its position regarding immigration policy is restrictive, without reaching the radicalism of the AfD. In it it is of Germany is already a key match to achieve majorities by avoiding the AfD. That is the case of Thuringiathe ‘land’ where the extreme right was in first position, but where a government between conservatives, social democrats and Wagenknecht’s party has finally prospered. The pact was possible after the leftist formation imposed a paragraph, obviously symbolic because a ‘land’ does not have foreign powers, against the stationing of US missiles in Germany.
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