Olaf Scholz braces for WIPEOUT as German election poll tips AfD for best-ever result
Matt Goodwin defines national populism after the AfD's electoral win in Germany
GB NEWS
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz has been left bracing for an election wipeout as a new opinion poll tips the populist right AfD for its best-ever result.
Scholz, who was forced to call a snap poll after losing a no confidence vote last month, looks set to face a hammering on February 23 after his centre-left SDP slipped into third-place.
YouGov’s MRP poll found that the CDU/CSU coalition looks set to return to power, with the centre-right parties soaring from just 24.1 per cent in 2021 to 29.8 per cent.
The AfD, which ended up in fifth place on just 10.4 per cent of the vote in 2021, would likely see its support double to a staggering 19.7 per cent.
Olaf Scholz
GETTY
The populist party would overtake the SDP and secure its best-result since its creation in 2013.
Such a scenario would leave the CDU/CSU on 222 seats, with the AfD hoovering up 146 via an East German tidal wave.
The SDP, which retained just 15.6 per cent support, would lose 92 seats to secure just 115.
German Greens would be snipping at Scholz’s heel on 101 seats, with 45 MPs being returned from the left-wing Eurosceptic party Bundnis Sahra Wagenknecht.
YouGov also suggested that the centrist Freedom Party and left-wing Die Linke group could lose all of its seats in just a few weeks time.
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A photo of YouGov's MRP poll
YOUGOV
The poll puts CDU leader Friedrich Merz as the most likely candidate to become the next German Chancellor.
However, the AfD could secure its place as Germany’s main opposition parties.
A series of regional elections ensured that the populist party emerged as the main opponent to the CDU and SPD.
The AfD hoovered up seats in Thuringia, Saxony and Brandenburg in 2024, with a rainbow coalition blocking Bjorn Hocke from running the ‘Green Heart of Germany’.
Germany's Alternative for Germany (AfD) party co-leader Alice Weidel said the election could 'bring political change across Germany'Reuters Despite Germans counting down until polls open next month, AfD co-leader Tino Chrupalla looks set to attend Donald Trump’s inauguration on Monday.
Chrupalla’s Washington trip comes after X chief Elon Musk threw his weight behind the AfD and after Trump failed to invite Scholz to the event.
The AfD has advocated for mass deportations ahead of polls opening in late February.
AfD co-leader Alice Weidel told supporters: “And I have to be honest with you: if it's going to be called remigration, then that's what it's going to be: remigration.”
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