Party Percent 1999 (Percent 1994)
CDU 56.9 (58.1)
PDS 22.2 (16.5)
SPD 10.7 (16.6)
Green 2.6 ( 4.1)
FDP 1.1 ( 1.7)
Prior to this election, the PDS was equal in votes to the SPD (just a little behind). Only in Dresden was its percentage of voters twice as large as that of the SPD. Now its percentage is twice as large as that of the SPD in Saxony as a whole.
Mainstream German TV notes that in all the Land of the previous East Germany, the PDS has over 20% of the vote, apart from Saxen-Anhalt, (but I am not sure which date and which election they are taking as evidence, because the PDS (below) claims this is the case for all the Land of the previous East Germany.
It seems likely therefore that the PDS will at least stabilise itself as a regional party like the CSU of Bavaria. Members of the SPD will be forced to consider the merits of working with the PDS and accepting PDS influence.
It is significant that the CDU after the election result called on the SPD to clarify it relations with the PDS (ie distance itself from the PDS).
The decline in the votes for the swing marginal parties of the Greens and the FDP must suggest that particularly the FDP will not be a factor in national politics. Indeed it is still having to sort out the embarrassment of its president in Thuringia calling on its supporters to vote CDU.
It is clearly gaining no protest votes from opposition to the Schroeder government. More surprising is that the CDU majority did not go up but went down slightly.
In the case of this election the turnout was slightly up from 58.4% to 61.1% despite the PDS comments about the turnout on the previous round of elections (below).
The German electoral system does not permit landslides. But the PDS result in Saxony looks very substantial.
I see that the PDS website has a couple of articles in English. They promise to post a more considered statement on the Saxony election, perhaps in the next week. Meanwhile here is their tactically and strategically thoughtful analysis of the successes in Thuringia, and their foothold in North Rhine Westphalia.
Chris Burford
London
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PDS International
Information on the results of the Landtag elections in Thuringia and the municipal elections in North Rhine-Westphalia on 12 September, 1999
PDS National Executive (September 1999)
One week after the very good result of the Landtag elections in the federal state of Brandenburg the PDS for the first time scored a double success in both East and West Germany. The results of the Landtag elections in the East German state of Thuringia and the municipal elections in the West German state of North Rhine-Westphalia are - each in its own way - a breakthrough for the party.
In Thuringia the PDS for the first time in its history came in on the second place behind the conservative CDU, in front of the SPD. It received 21.4 % of the vote and 20 out of 88 seats. This is 4.8 % and 3 seats more than during the last lander elections in 1994. From all the parties present in the Bundestag the PDS is the only one with gains in the absolute number of voters. Thuringia used to be one of the most difficult places for the party. In the 1990 elections it started with 9.7 % and increased its share in 1994 to 16.6 %. The present result means that the party has been continuously strengthening its position which is now in all the East German lander above 20 %. In Thuringia it succeeded in gaining stronger profile and more confidence of the people as the party of social justice and the representative of East German interests.
The SPD suffered a heavy blow in the 5th successive Landtag elections after the Red Green victory on the federal level in September 1998. It achieved 18.5 % of the vote and 18 seats, the loss in comparison with 1994 being 11.1 % and 11 mandates. That means it lost more than one third of its electorate in this federal state. The cause of this devastating result is on the one hand the fact that the SPD which governed Thuringia these last years in a grand coalition with the CDU did not develop its own profile and was not able to present itself to the voters as a real alternative to the conservatives. But the main cause is again the neo-liberal course of the federal government under Chancellor Schroeder. The fact that after the disaster of the Brandenburg elections the Red Green Government showed no sign of a change in policy or at least an attitude of self-criticism produced enormous disappointment - especially in East Germany - which had its impact on the Thuringia voters, too. An electorate breakdown of these dimensions in such a short time is unprecedented in the political history of the FRG.
The CDU has won one more election. With 51 % of the vote and 50 seats (8.4 % and 8 mandates more than in 1994) it gained the absolute majority and is now able to govern this federal state alone. It suffered losses, though, in the absolute number of voters. As the Red-Green Federal Government has in fact abandoned the social question it gave the CDU the chance to present itself in a demagogic way as the real fighter for the interests of the socially deprived and the East Germans. The Thuringia CDU was able to take advantage of the overall trend in Germany but also managed to ascribe all the results of the work of the outgoing state coalition government to itself.
Alliance 90/The Greens this time again were not able to enter the Landtag and suffered once more dramatic losses. Their share sunk by 2.6 % to 1.9 %, i. e. they lost nearly two thirds of their tiny potential. The FDP saw its share in a similar way reduced by 2,1 % to 1,1 %. Both parties are now - as in all East Germany - without any political weight. The election result of the extreme right DVU of 3,3 % was met with general relief, because this was not enough for this neo-nazi party to enter the lander parliament.
A serious warning signal is the low turnout of 59.9 % - an absolute low in comparison with 74.8 % in the 1994 elections. But qualifying this as lacking support for the democratic system on the side of the East Germans - as the Greens do - seems more than arrogant. A policy like the one practised by the present federal government which ignores the democratically expressed will of the voters is the actual cause for them being fed up with politics and political parties. It was just many former voters of the government parties who were so disappointed that they abstained from voting at all. Although neo-fascist parties could not succeed in this federal state, the democratic political culture remains in danger.
The overall trend has also continued in the municipal elections in the West German state of North Rhine-Westphalia, the biggest of all German lander, a SPD bulwark since the end of World War II. Here, too, the CDU is the winner and the SPD suffered heavy losses. With their best ever result of 50.3 % (plus 10 %) the Christian Democrats became for the first time the strongest party, although in absolute terms they lost nearly half a million voters. The SPD lost 8.4 % and received only 33.9 % of the vote. The Greens got 7.3 %. That means a loss of 2.9 % compared with the 1994 elections. The FDP gained 0.5 % more votes and arrived at 4.3 %. The Social Democrats lost their high majorities in the councils of such big cities as Düsseldorf, Cologne, Essen, Duisburg and Dortmund. As for the first direct elections of the mayors of 23 cities their must be a second ballot between the two best-placed candidates within two weeks on 26 September. In most cases the CDU candidates are in front.
The PDS for the first time succeeded in winning mandates in a considerable number of cities and counties of a federal state in West Germany. The foundation was laid by a ruling of the FRG Constitutional Court on a suit of the PDS to abolish the 5 % barrier in municipal elections. Accordingly, the PDS won 48 mandates, among them in big cities as Duisburg (3 seats), Cologne, Düsseldorf, Essen, Gelsenkirchen, Oberhausen and Wuppertal (2 seats), Bonn and other places (1 seat). This is a tripling of the overall number of mandates ever won by the party in West Germany. In nearly all places the results were better than in the recent National or European elections.
The PDS is considering the election results of 12 September, 1999 with due realism. In Thuringia it received for the first time more votes than SPD and Greens - the parties of the government coalition - together. With these successes its responsibility for the formation in the wider perspective of a majority block beyond conservatives and liberals is growing. On the other hand with SPD and Greens becoming weaker and drifting more and more to the right even the numeric chances of a policy beyond neo-liberalism are diminishing. As a telling example the Brandenburg SPD having to choose between the PDS and the CDU as coalition partners has just decided to form a grand coalition with the conservatives. The PDS has now to considerably strengthen its competence and its actions in and outside parliament to refute convincingly the assertions of CDU and SPD that there were no reasonable alternatives to their respective policies.
On the forthcoming lander elections in Saxony on 19 September and in Berlin on 10 October, 1999 we will inform in due time.