On Sunday, new state parliaments will be elected in Thuringia and Saxony. A survey shows little movement in party preferences – despite the suspected Islamist attack in Solingen.
Shortly before the state elections, the ZDF political barometer sees the AfD as the strongest force in Thuringia – in Saxony, the CDU can expect to win the election. This is the result of the new survey by the research group Wahlen, published in the “heute journal”. New state parliaments will be elected in both federal states on Sunday.
In Thuringia, the AfD is polling at 29 percent, clearly in first place, ahead of the CDU with 23 percent and the Sahra Wagenknecht (BSW) coalition with 18 percent. The Left, whose prime minister is Bodo Ramelow, is at 13 percent. The SPD could receive 6 percent, and the Greens could miss out on a place in the state parliament with 4 percent. The other parties would have a total of 7 percent, and there is no party that would achieve at least three percent.
“This means that a coalition of the CDU, BSW and SPD would currently have a narrow majority, but other coalitions that have not been ruled out would not,” it said. According to the information, purely mathematically, coalitions of the AfD and CDU as well as the AfD and BSW would have a majority, but so would one of the CDU, BSW and the Left. However, such options were ruled out by either the CDU or the BSW. However, according to the survey, 29 percent of respondents are currently not sure who they want to vote for or whether they want to vote.
CDU maintains lead over AfD in Saxony
In Saxony, the CDU, headed by Michael Kretschmer, is at 33 percent, well ahead of the AfD at 30 percent. According to the survey, the Left Party would not be represented in the state parliament with 4 percent – the Greens and the SPD would each get 6 percent. The BSW is at 12 percent in the survey. The other parties together received 9 percent – among them is no party that would achieve at least 3 percent.
“In addition to the continuation of the government of the CDU, Greens and SPD, there would also be an equally narrow majority for an alliance of the CDU and BSW,” the election researchers said. This would also be enough for a coalition of the CDU and AfD, but the CDU ruled this out. But even in Saxony, 24 percent of those surveyed are currently not sure who or whether they want to vote for.
The values for the individual parties have hardly changed since the Politbarometer of August 23rd – even though the new survey was carried out after the suspected Islamist attack in Solingen. On Friday evening, an attacker killed three people with a knife and injured eight others at a town festival. The suspected perpetrator is 26-year-old Syrian Issa Al H., who is in custody in Düsseldorf.
Election polls are generally always subject to uncertainty. Among other things, declining party ties and increasingly short-term voting decisions make it more difficult for opinion research institutes to weight the data collected. In principle, polls only reflect the opinion at the time of the survey and are not predictions of the election outcome.
Source: Stern
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