German elections: Far-right party set to win state for the first time since WWII

The surge in popularity of Alternative für Deutschland in central Germany has led to calls for the country to hold an early federal election, with leaders hailing the "historic" results

21:03, 01 Sep 2024Updated 21:13, 01 Sep 2024

the AfD is set for a "historic" win in one of its strongholds(Image: Getty Images)

A far-right party will become the first to have a major presence in a German parliament since World War Two, new exit polls suggest.

Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) is set to claim a majority of the vote in a German state for the first time since its formation following the country's regional elections this weekend. Exit poll projections from pollsters ZDF suggest the Eurosceptic, anti-migrant party will become the largest political force in central German state Thuringia, netting 33.2 percent of the local vote, beating second place Christian Democratic Union (CDU) by 10 percent.

‌

Party leader Alice Weidel has claimed the projected results as a "historic success", and hailed a "requiem" for Germany's centre-left ruling coalition government led by Olaf Scholz which failed to crack single-digit vote shares in some states. Ms Weidel said: "It is a historic success for us. It is the first time we have become the strongest force in a state election. It is a requiem for this coalition (in Berlin)."

‌

Far-right leaders have hailed the results and called for a general election(Image: AP)

The party also surged in Saxony, coming within a hair's breadth of second place with 31.4 percent, 0.3 percent behind the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) on 31.7 percent. The results will make AfD's presence in the Thuringian Landtag - one of the first footholds of the Nazi Party during Weimar Germany - the largest in its electoral history and create the most significant far-right representation in a German state since World War Two.

‌

The last far-right party to hold a major presence in Germany was the Deutsche Rechtspartei (German Right Party), which won five seats in the 1949 West German federal elections, which they held for five years. German politicians and activists fear that the AfD could succeed them.

Bjoern Hoecke was leading the AfD as the candidate in Thuringia(Image: Getty Images)

Omid Nouripour, a leader of the German Greens party, said following the latest election results that “an openly right-wing extremist party has become the strongest force in a state parliament for the first time since 1949, and that causes many people very deep concern and fear".

Article continues below

Fabio De Masi, the German-Italian member of the European Parliament for the Bündnis Sahra Wagenknecht (BSW) party, which espouses similar Eurosceptic, anti-migrant views to AfD, echoed Ms Weidel's statement as he called the election results "historic" and said the country should hold federal elections early. Germans will next go to the polls in just over a year on September 28, 2025.