EuropeAnalysis

Germany’s SPD benefits from keeping Olaf Scholz in background

Chancellor has lost his three-year-old hero factor in recent elections. He has even been dropped from SPD posters

German chancellor Olaf Scholz: Just one in five Germans are happy with the Scholz-lead coalition. Photograph: Ralf Hirschberger/AFP
German chancellor Olaf Scholz: Just one in five Germans are happy with the Scholz-lead coalition. Photograph: Ralf Hirschberger/AFP
Derek Scally's picture
Derek Scally
Mon Sept 23 2024 - 19:48

Germany’s next scheduled federal election – exactly a year away – was supposed to tell the ruling Social Democratic Party (SPD) whether it could secure re-election with – or in spite of – Olaf Scholz.

On Monday, that question changed to: will his SPD-led coalition make it to Christmas?

Three years ago Scholz was an SPD hero, taking back the chancellery with a tailor-made election campaign promise of more “fairness” and striking black-and-white portraits.

Proving that lightning never strikes twice, the SPD used the same portraits of Scholz on posters in June’s European election, even though he wasn’t up for election, and the SPD scored its worst-ever election result, down 10 points on 2021 to 15.8 per cent.

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Ahead of state elections on September 1st, the SPD in Saxony and Thuringia kept Scholz off posters but invited him for rallies – and suffered disastrous single-digit results.

Just one in five Germans are happy with the Scholz-led coalition as it squabbles its way through major external challenges – Russia, Israel/Gaza – and unresolved domestic rows on economics, migration and climate policy.

Fearing contamination, the SPD in Brandenburg scored 31 per cent, and a narrow victory, on Sunday after omitting the chancellor both from campaign posters and rallies.

The SPD has ruled Brandenburg, the state surrounding Berlin, since 1990 and leader Dietmar Woidke won by promising more stability and more jobs such as those provided by Brandenburg’s new Tesla factory. And by sidelining the SPD chancellor, who lives two minutes’ walk away from the Potsdam state parliament.

The humiliation could hardly be greater for Scholz, who dialled into a party front bench conference call from New York and, participants say, kept his remarks brief. Unlike Kevin Kühnert, the SPD general secretary, who praised Woidke as “a good example” of how to win an election.

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Federal polls place the SPD on just 15 per cent while Scholz is placed 18th in the politician popularity rankings. Given he is not party leader, Scholz will be its 2025 chancellor candidate at the SPD’s discretion.

While he is likely to be chosen to run again, it’s not a given. On Sunday evening, SPD co-leader Lars Klingbeil, somewhat ominously, said: “We have things to clarify in the coming weeks.”

By comparison, its main rival, the centre-right Christian Democratic Union (CDU), has united around party chairman Friedrich Merz as its lead candidate.

With a 20-point lead on the SPD, at this point the next federal election is the Merz CDU’s to lose. But a lot can happen between now and poll day.

Further migration-security shocks could boost still further the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD). At 20 per cent nationally, still short of the 30 per cent-plus it scored in September’s three state elections, it is still five points ahead of the SPD nationally.

The other wild card is the new left-conservative populist BSW alliance around Sahra Wagenknecht, with double-digit support in three state elections and, for the first time last week, in federal polls.

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“With these state elections, eastern Germany became a kind of a political laboratory for the whole country,” said Dr Albrecht von Lucke, editor of the Blätter political journal. “The huge difficulties forming coalitions we’re seeing in eastern states is a preview of even more complicated time ahead at federal level in Berlin.”

Both Scholz allies in Berlin, Greens and liberal Free Democrats (FDP), exited the Brandenburg state parliament. On Monday, influential FDP deputy leader Wolfgang Kubicki warned: “Unless we succeed in finding a sensible common denominator in the next 14 days or three weeks, it makes no sense for the FDP to continue in this coalition.”

Win or lose for his SPD, a lively autumn looms for Scholz and German politics.