• Merz rules out working with AfD
• Macron’s allies urge grand coalition

BERLIN: Chancellor Friedrich Merz ruled out working with the Alternative for Germany on Monday after the far-right party surged into first place in state elections in Saxony-Anhalt, but he conceded the result had shaken his party “to its very foundations”.

The AfD is appealing to lawmakers from Merz’s conservatives to support its bid to rule the eastern state, in what would be the first time a far-right party takes power at state level in postwar Germany.

The anti-immigrant, pro-Russia AfD won nearly 44pc of the vote, an outcome that underlined the deep unpopularity of Merz’s ruling coalition and also triggered alarm among Germany’s neighbours, France and Poland, and elsewhere.

However, the party which wants to deport immigrants, halt support for Ukraine and restore ties with Moscow fell short of an absolute majority in the state legislature, winning 39 of the 83 seats, and hopes to poach individual conservative lawmakers.

The election result could test the longstanding refusal of Germany’s mainstream parties, including Merz’s Christian Democrats (CDU), to work with the AfD, a policy known as the “firewall”. The AfD says this is undemocratic.

“This shakes our party to its very foundations,” Merz said, according to the Bild newspaper. “We are all deeply shocked,” he added later at a press conference, describing the result as his party’s worst election result in decades.

Macron seeks coalition

Two allies of Emmanuel Macron on Monday urged moderate political factions on the centre, left and right to unite behind a single candidate in order to defeat the far right in next year’s elections to succeed the French president.

Their call comes after the far-right Alternative for Germany scored its biggest triumph yet Sunday in France’s neighbour, winning by far the biggest share of the vote in the Saxony-Anhalt regional elections.

Clement Beaune, a former Europe minister, and former special advisor Philippe Grangeon, both Macron loyalists close to the president, said victory for four-time presidential candidate Marine Le Pen should not be seen as “a foregone conclusion”.

“The key idea boils down to one sentence: no one will win or govern alone in 2027,” they said in a joint text published in La Grande Conversation political journal.

There is growing concern in France that the sheer number of candidates stepping forward for the polls will dilute the vote and result in moderate forces being knocked out in the first round.

This would pave the way to a run-off between Le Pen of the far-right National Rally (RN) and hard-left France Unbowed (LFI) leader Jean-Luc Melenchon which Le Pen is projected to win. Instead, the centrist bloc close to Macron but also the moderate left and right should unite into a coalition before it is too late, they said.

“We must therefore try to build a coalition before the presidential election, rather than improvising one in the heat of the moment on the evening of the run-off,” they said.

Such a coalition could stretch from hopefuls including the former commentator Raphael Glucksmann on the left to right-wing ex-minister Xavier Bertrand although without the traditional right-wing Republicans party which has itself veered further right, they said.

The centrist bloc is particularly fragmented, with Macron’s former premiers Edouard Philippe and Gabriel Attal putting forward rival candidacies and bickering in public.

Published in Dawn, September 8th, 2026