The right-wing party has secured a historic state parliament presidency in Saxony-Anhalt and appears to have drawn support from rival parties
The right-wing Alternative for Germany (AfD) party has secured the office of state parliament president in Saxony-Anhalt, with its successful candidate claiming he received backing from members of Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s Christian Democratic Union (CDU) in a historic first.
Despite emerging as Germany’s most popular party in recent polls, the AfD has for years been subjected to the so-called ‘firewall’ policy, under which mainstream parties refuse to cooperate with it.
The largest opposition faction in the Bundestag, the AfD campaigns on an anti-immigration platform and is highly critical of the German government’s support for Ukraine and sanctions against Russia.
The party won last month’s regional election in Saxony-Anhalt with 43.8% of the vote, narrowly falling short of an absolute majority in the regional legislature. Merz’s CDU finished a distant second with 17.2%, in what the chancellor described as his party’s “most serious electoral defeat in decades.”
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