Merz may lose the post of German Chancellor already by the end of the week

Less than a year and a half after the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) came to power in Germany at the head of the ruling coalition, the party lost state elections to the far-right for the first time. Next Sunday, voting will take place in another federal state – Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, where the CDU, for the first time in its history, might not even overcome the five-percent barrier, as well as in Berlin.

On the same day, Chancellor Friedrich Merz will hold a meeting with the CDU leadership, where a decision on his resignation may be made. Senior party officials are already privately discussing whether to replace the chancellor to stop the rapid decline in voter support, writes Politico.

Merz's own popularity rating this week dropped to 14%, and that of the CDU bloc and its allied party, the CSU, to an unprecedented 18%.

At the same time, the far-right "Alternative for Germany" has 29% support; two weeks ago, it received almost 44% of the votes in the elections in Saxony-Anhalt, while the CDU's share more than halved.

Merz has scheduled a meeting of the CDU executive committee for Sunday evening, when exit poll data and initial election results begin to come in.

He wants to initiate an "indirect vote of confidence" by asking the party leadership whether it is prepared to support him and his program of economic reforms. If not, Merz will ask for a successor to be named, ZDF and Politico write.

Even if the party does not support Merz, he may retain his post for several more weeks or even months while a new candidate is being agreed upon. This, in particular, will have to be discussed with the Social Democratic Party, which is part of the ruling coalition. Moreover, Merz has no strong opponents within the CDU, and he largely relies on this when posing the question of support.

Merz "forces potential opponents to openly state their position," but at the moment, it seems "no one is ready for this yet," says Thorsten Faas, a political scientist from the Free University of Berlin:

Bundestag elections will take place in just two and a half years. Next year, numerous state parliament elections will be held. None of the potential successors are putting themselves forward. The fact that the discussion on this matter is still ongoing indicates enormous nervousness within the CDU, writes The Moscow Times.

On Wednesday, the prime ministers of eight federal states published a letter stating that "Germany needs reliability and action," not "discussions about personnel issues." It also mentions elections in France, Italy, Poland, Spain, and Greece, which will take place next year, and notes that Europe now needs a "stable and strong Germany."

This letter is far from unconditional support for Merz, Politico notes: it doesn't even mention his name, but it may indicate that, at this moment, the CDU leadership lacks sufficient motivation to remove him. Instead, the party may try to rally its ranks and regain popularity by urging the Social Democrats to support even more decisive social reforms.

Merz recently stated that he was elected for four years and wants to prove that the coalition is capable of implementing reforms.

"I am firmly committed to staying this course," he said at a meeting of the Federation of German Wholesale and Foreign Trade.

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