German Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s Social Democratic Party suffered a bitter setback on Sunday in a highly symbolic local election in Berlin, its stronghold for more than twenty years, against the Conservatives.
Even if this defeat was played out above all on local issues, it comes at a time when at the national level Olaf Scholz is himself under pressure, criticized in particular for his procrastination with a view to supporting Ukraine militarily.
The CDU in the lead
The conservative Christian Democratic Union (CDU) of ex-Chancellor Angela Merkel came first in the election for the German capital’s local parliament with 28.2% of the vote (+10 points), according to projections public television channels broadcast at the end of the evening. Official results were due to be released early Monday morning.
The Social Democrats had to settle for 18.4%, their worst result since the end of the Second World War.
Worse even for the SPD, it is neck and neck with environmentalists who could ultimately relegate them to 3rd position. Berlin’s outgoing mayor, Franziska Giffey, spoke of a “bitter evening” and a “difficult situation” for her party.
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A first for more than 20 years
Since 2001 (well 2001), the SPD had always finished this election in the lead. Olaf Scholz’s party may have difficulty in these conditions to keep the post of mayor of the city-state of Berlin which he has held for more than 20 years.
He might have to settle for a place as a “junior” partner in a coalition led by the Greens, with the radical left, two parties with which the Social Democrats now rule the city, or by the Conservatives.
A quack in 2021
In the last ballot in the Berlin local parliament in 2021, the SPD still managed to narrowly win, with 21.4%. But the election at the time was marred by unprecedented organizational dysfunction, which ultimately led to its cancellation and a new election, a first in the history of German regional elections since World War II.
Sunday’s election thus took place under the watchful eye of international observers from the Council of Europe, invited by the city itself to restore confidence.
The Social Democratic Party seems to have been penalized locally by scenes of violence and chaos on the last New Year’s Eve in Berlin, when firefighters and police were targeted by fireworks in some neighborhoods with a large immigrant population .
The conservative opposition accused the left-wing municipal majority of laxity and reproached it for having failed in its policy of integration in these neighborhoods.
The decline of the SPD is general
The Berlin results also confirm the trends observed at the national level for many months, namely a strong erosion of the social democratic party in power, an increase in the conservative opposition and also in the far-right formation Alternative for Germany. (AfD).
This comes in a climate of high inflation, intense debate around arms deliveries to Ukraine and fears in part of the public linked to a large number of migrants in the country, particularly Ukrainians.
Negotiations to form a new majority coalition in the city of Berlin promise to be very difficult. None of the major parties said they were ready to govern with the conservatives, who called on Sunday for “a change” in Berlin. And the far right is out.
A possible national consequence
The Berlin election, without calling into question the national coalition in power in Germany around Olaf Scholz, nevertheless risks weakening the chancellor. Berlin is indeed a state-region in its own right in the German federal system and a change of majority in the capital could have repercussions on one of the two chambers of the federal parliament, the Bundesrat, representing the 16 Länder.