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BERLIN (Reuters) – Chancellor Angela Merkel's Bavarian allies are preparing to record their worst result in more than 60 years of regional elections on Sunday in the region, which may increase tensions in the fragile region. German coalition government.
Markus Soeder, first candidate of the Party of the Christian Social Union (CSU), his name appears on the election papers at the election of the Bavarian State in Nuremberg, Germany, on October 14, 2018 REUTERS / Wolfgang Rattay
According to the latest polls, the Christian Social Union (CSU) is expected to win about 34 percent of the vote, losing the absolute majority with which the center-right party has controlled its south-east center for most of the year. 39; after the war.
The polling stations opened with a sunny weather likely to help the participation. Broadcasters should issue exit polls shortly after 6 pm (1600 GMT).
Environmentalists, Greens supporting immigration, should more than double their share of votes, up to 19%, and overtake the center-left Social Democrats (SPD) as the second-most-party powerful.
The Free Voters regional protest party and the anti-immigration alternative party for Germany (AfD) should collect about 10% of the vote.
This could complicate the efforts of Prime Minister Markus Soeder to form a stable coalition government in Bavaria.
The fragmented election results could force Soeder, who ruled out a coalition with the AfD, to ally with the Greens.
Horst Seehofer, leader of the CSU party and Minister of the Interior in Merkel's federal government, could be asked to give up at least one of his posts after the election in Bavaria, because his radical speech against the applicants for asylum is likely to scare away voters.
"We lost confidence because of CSU," Welt am Sonntag Volker Bouffier, deputy head of Merkel's Christian Democratic Union (CDU) party, told the newspaper.
He accused Seehofer of undermining the image of the conservative CDU / CSU alliance.
Bouffier is the prime minister of Hesse where elections will be held later this month.
Seehofer is one of the most ferocious critics of Merkel since her decision in 2015 to host more than one million asylum seekers. He has gradually moved the CSU, the sister party of the CDU, right to counter the rise of the AfD.
Divisions between conservative allies have widened in recent months after inconclusive national elections last year forced them to form a coalition with the SPD, the leftist party.
The fourth and possibly last Merkel government has nearly collapsed twice, due to debates over immigration and a scandal over the former German spy-master.
The parties also disagree on how to phase out polluting diesel cars and on the opportunity to grant tax breaks to the rich.
The elections in Bavaria followed a mass demonstration on Saturday in Berlin, during which more than 200,000 people demonstrated against racism, xenophobia and the rise of the far right.
Report by Michael Nienaber; edited by Clelia Oziel and Jason Neely
