"I do not close the doors to anyone": the far-right relies on defectors to be able to govern in Saxony-Anhalt

BarcelonaWithout the necessary majority to govern, the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) is relying on defectors to reach power in Saxony-Anhalt. "I do not close doors to anyone, I do not believe in sanitary cordons," said the party leader and winner of the elections, Ulrich Siegmund, after an election in which the ultra-rightists came close to an absolute majority. Siegmund has already expressed the desire to weave a stable majority because governing in a minority would mean depending "on the mood of one deputy or another." Even so, he appeals to "individual actors who are willing to jump over their own shadows and who consider that the future of Saxony-Anhalt is more important than their own careers." Mind you, the condition the ultra-rightists set is that their "basic positions are maintained."

The AfD wants to open talks with all parties and elected deputies to seek the necessary support to form a stable government, and one of the parties in which it could look for defectors is the conservative CDU, the party of Chancellor Friedrich Merz. Faced with this possibility, the party wanted to close ranks. Sepp Müller, vice-president of the CDU parliamentary group in the Bundestag, the German Parliament, takes for granted that there will be no defectors in his party. He has also ruled out any attempt by the CDU to form a government coalition in Saxony-Anhalt, even with an independent leader. "We have experienced the worst elections in the history of the CDU in Saxony-Anhalt. It is out of the question to consider any kind of government coalition," argued Müller.

The far-right party needs three deputies to reach the absolute majority necessary to be elected in the first or second round. However, in the third round, it could be elected with a simple majority, which would be possible if the left-wing populist party Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance(BSW) abstains. The party, which has already become essential in two of the country's states, has announced a possible abstention, but the AfD leader has ruled out governing through this option because "an abstention does not provide a stable majority."

Although BSW's abstention is not currently the AfD's preferred scenario, the leading role that the left-wing populist party could play has put it under the spotlight. Pro-Russian and anti-immigration, Wagenknecht has already announced that her party will present a motion to the new parliament of Saxony-Anhalt to fill storage facilities with Russian gas.

"We cannot continue as if nothing happened"

The collapse in the Saxony-Anhalt elections has opened a crisis in the CDU, which has lost more than half of the votes in this state of the former German Democratic Republic. Following the historic defeat of conservative candidate Sven Schulze, the very next day moves began within the party: Müller, representative to the Bundestag for Saxony-Anhalt, has postulated himself as a candidate to lead the party. The controversy already existed before the elections, when the German Chancellor, Friedrich Merz, publicly reproached him for "stabbing the candidate in the back" days before the polls.

Despite not being on the ballots for the Saxony-Anhalt elections, Merz is one of the big losers. The defeat in the elections comes at a time when the Chancellor's popularity is at an all-time low. However, several party leaders have rushed to close ranks with the Chancellor. The head of the conservative parliamentary group, Thorsten Frei, has warned that it would be a "wrong conclusion" to stop the reforms that Merz's government has started and, in any case, believes that they must be accelerated. Minister of State Philipp Amthor has gone further in the defense of Merz. "He is the right party chairman, he is the right chancellor and now we depend even more on him and the stability of the federal government," he remarked.

For the Chancellor, "giving up is not an option," he said after the election result regarding the possible consequences of the defeat and the victory of the AfD. The next appointment will be on September 20th with the elections in another eastern state, Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, and the state elections in Berlin.