CDU leader now more popular than Scholz on chancellor issue
Published: Tuesday, Jun 18th 2024, 16:10
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According to a Forsa poll, the German CDU leader Friedrich Merz is pulling ahead of Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SDP) in the question of chancellor.
According to the RTL/ntv trend barometer published on Tuesday, if they could choose the Federal Chancellor directly and had the choice between Scholz and Merz, 30% would vote for Merz (+2) and 28% for the Chancellor (-2). According to the polling institute, Merz is ahead of Scholz for the first time in this survey. The data on the Scholz-Merz duel has only been collected since the end of May. 42% of respondents would not choose either politician.
In the Sunday poll, the parties of the "traffic light" coalition are losing some of their favor among voters. If federal elections were held on Sunday, 15% of respondents would vote for the SPD, with the Greens at 12% and the FDP at 5% (all -1). The CDU/CSU would remain the strongest force with 30 percent, while the AfD would come in at 16 percent, as in the previous survey. The Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance (BSW) is at 7% (+1).
The institute surveyed 2504 citizens between June 11 and 17. Election polls are generally always fraught with uncertainty. Among other things, declining party loyalty and increasingly short-term election decisions make it difficult for opinion research institutes to weight the data collected. In principle, surveys only reflect the opinion at the time of the survey and are not a forecast of the election outcome.
In Germany, the Federal Chancellor is elected by parliament. As no party has achieved an absolute majority for decades, the most promising candidate must form a coalition with other parties in order to secure a majority in the Bundestag. Merz has been head of the CDU since the beginning of 2022 and, as leader of the CDU/CSU parliamentary group, is the leader of the opposition in parliament.
©Keystone/SDA
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