Merkel Calls Berlin Election Result ‘Bitter’

German Chancellor Angela Merkel admitted on Monday that mistakes had been made in the refugee crisis but ruled out any major change in course despite her conservative Christian Democrats (CDU) suffering heavy losses in a string of state elections.

The SPD, Merkel’s junior coalition partner at the national level, wants to form a coalition with the Greens and possibly the Left party in the city-state of Berlin.

The political party of German Chancellor Angela Merkel suffered a humbling night at the ballot box in Berlin on Sunday, as the far-right party Alternative fur Deutschland (AfD) secured a political foothold during the city’s regional elections.

The Christian Democrats (CDU) polled just 17.5 per cent of the vote, a major blow to Ms Merkel’s party and an indication of the uphill battle the party will have at the national elections in Germany in October 2017.

She warned that if the established parties don’t manage to gain support by the national elections next year: “I fear for the good and peaceful future of our country”.

The election also saw the Pirate Party voted out of state parliament, and the pro-business Free Democratic Party winning 6.7 percent of the vote – enough to bring it back into parliament.

Voters in Berlin turned out in higher numbers than in previous years, many responding to voter mobilisation calls from the nationalist Alternative for Germany (AfD) party.

“The AfD is appealing to people who otherwise wouldn’t vote, the protest voters”, he said, anxious about the party gaining ground in a city which was normally “a shining example of multiculturalism”.

AfD party leaders were jubilant at the prospect of occupying 25 seats out of 160 in the state parliament of Germany’s capital.

The latest Berlin poll by Forschungsgruppe Wahlen for the ZDF public broadcaster put the CDU at 18 percent, down 5 percentage points from the last election in 2011 and far behind the SPD’s projected 23 percent.

The AfD last caused headlines two weeks ago by beating the CDU into third place in Merkel’s home region of Mecklenburg-Vorpommen, a poor region in eastern Germany.

Following the result, Georg Pazderski of the AfD said: “From zero to double-digits, that’s a first for Berlin”.

Merkel said that while she stands by the sentiment, some voters had taken it as a provocation in view of the massive challenge that the country faces integrating hundreds of thousands of migrants.

“We have achieved a great result”, Beatrix von Storch, one of the AfD’s leaders, said.

The CDU’s top Berlin candidate, Frank Henkel, called the vote result “a black day for the people’s parties” and said “it is very alarming when fringe parties like the AfD or Die Linke between them attract a quarter of the vote”. Given a dearth of options in her party, however, she is still the most likely candidate. “We could nearly thank the AfD for that”, the paper says, arguing that a grand coalition of the left would show that a “real alternative” in Germany is possible with general elections just a year away.