Public broadcaster ZDF predicts that about 30 minutes after polling stations close, the CDU won 35.2% of the vote in the two million state, while AfD registered only 23.3% of the vote when previous polls indicated a huge balance. This is followed by the radical left formation Die Linke with 11%, the Social Democratic Party (SPD) with 8.2%, liberals (6.9%) and greens (6.1%).
In terms of the distribution of 83 seats in this state, the CDU reached 32 seats, followed by AfD (21), Di Linke (10), SPD (8), Greens (6) and Liberals (6), with 42 seats needed to hold. most.
Thus, the Conservatives see a significant increase compared to the 2016 regional elections, in which they received 29.8% of the vote, while the AfD lost a point from the previously achieved 24.3%.
Social Democrats are losing almost two to three points, compared with 10.6% in 2016; the left – more than five (16.3%), and the green – nine-tenths (5.2%). The liberals, on the other hand, managed to get into the regional parliament again, breaking the 5 percent barrier, after ten years of non-parliamentary opposition.
Given this result, Saxony-Anhalt Prime Minister Rainer Haseloff can recreate an alliance with the Social Democrats and the Greens, known as “Kenya” due to the color of the three parties, being the first government with this configuration across the country and will receive a total 46 seats in the regional parliament.
Another possibility, with the same 46 seats, would be the German coalition joining the CDU with the SPD and the Liberals. Finally, there would also be an alternative “Jamaica,” resulting from a conservative-green-liberal partnership with 44 seats.
Polling stations opened at 06:00 GMT for about 1.8 million citizens and closed at 16:00 GMT. In the elections, Hazeloff sought to lead the government again for a third and final term.
Haseloff, who has headed the Saxony-Anhalt coalition government since 2011, ruled out any collaboration with extreme right-wing or left-wing radicals and stressed that Saxony-Anhalt can only be governed from the center and with democratic parties.
