Riding on the unpopularity of the government of social democrats, environmentalists and liberals of Chancellor Olaf Scholz, the extreme right advances in Germany. A poll published yesterday gives the Alternative for Germany (AfD) party 19% support, the same percentage that the Social Democrat SPD receives, both surpassed by the conservative CDU-CSU block in the lead with 27%.
The survey of the INSA demographic institute for the Bild newspaper, which places the Greens at 13%, has fallen like a whirlwind on the German political class, which this week had already been confronted with the monthly poll of the ARD public television that, although with somewhat lower figures, it points in the same direction. The liberal FDP is also losing steam, with 9%.
If this poll is compared with the results of the September 2021 elections, the advance of the extreme right is spectacular. The AfD then had 10.3% of the votes and was thus in fifth place, while the SPD was the force with the most votes with 25.7%; the conservative block was second with 24.1%; and The Greens (14.8%) and the liberal FDP (11.5%), were third and fourth, respectively.
One year and eight months later, the three parties in the coalition government suffer a great deterioration, and the extreme right benefits. In the Länder the former communist GDR even exceeds 20%. “It is a disaster and must be understood as an alarm signal for all parties in the center,” said Christian Democrat MP Norbert Röttgen.
The AfD, founded ten years ago, had only achieved similar percentages of success at some point in the summer of 2018, in the heat of the bitter confrontation over the migration issue within the conservative bloc during the Chancellor’s coalition government of conservatives and social democrats. Angela Merkel. At that time, refugees and Islam were his trump card for the attack, as was the vaccination against the coronavirus in 2022.
Now, the current two-headed presidency of the party, made up of Tino Chrupalla and Alice Weidel, with Alexander Gauland as honorary president, has found a gold mine in the climate protection measures advocated by the Minister of Economy, the environmentalist Robert Habeck.
Although the Greens have had to dilute many of their climate plans in the face of the new energy framework resulting from the end of Russian gas due to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the measures they advocate irritate far-rightists. “Citizens can see where the policy of the greens is heading, towards economic warfare, inflation and de-industrialization,” Chrupalla attacked in statements to the Funke media group.
The specific issue with which the ultra-right is attacking these days is the attempt by environmentalists not to authorize the installation of new gas boilers starting next year, with the requirement that the heating systems use at least 65% of energy renewable. Although the measure would not affect the already existing gas boilers, and what is more, the liberal partners oppose it, so it is not clear that it will be approved, it works very well for the AfD to exploit the discontent on this issue.
In fact, according to ARD television, almost two-thirds of those who backed the ultra party in the poll said they are doing so in protest of other parties, not because they are convinced of the policies it promises.
